Meta has been spending like crazy on AI. It’s actually paying off.
Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. Meta Platforms doesn’t sell artificial-intelligence services or data-center capacity, but it might be reaping some of the richest benefits from the AI boom so far. The company nearly doubled its capital spending, from $39 billion in 2024 to $72 billion in 2025.
A staggering level of up to $135 billion is projected for this year—a total that would be bigger than the gross domestic product of many small nations. After Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg teased in October the company’s aggressive plans to spend on new data centers, investors punished the stock, sending shares down around 7% in after-hours trading. But since Meta revealed its latest capital-expenditure guidance Wednesday in its fourth-quarter earnings release, they have been rewarding Meta, with shares climbing 10% on Thursday.
Why? Because Meta also offered evidence that AI is helping its advertising-business boom like never before. “I think what we’re seeing is sort of a sustainable trend that’s largely grounded in some of the AI investments that they’ve made," said Benjamin Black, an internet analyst at Deutsche Bank. Meta’s revenue grew 22% year over year in 2025 to $201 billion, and the company expects even bigger gains in the current quarter, potentially as high as 34%.
That is huge growth for a company that brought in nearly $60 billion in the latest three-month period. And Zuckerberg signaled that Meta was just scratching the surface of AI’s potential. “Our world-class recommendation systems are already driving meaningful growth across our apps and ads business.
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