Social media giant Facebook is shedding the last vestige of its old corporate avatar as it transmutes into META. This is coming after a decade of trading as Facebook.
It will commence trading under the ticker symbol ‘META’ on Thursday.
In the hope that the metaverse, a shared virtual realm, will succeed mobile internet, Meta Platforms Inc rebranded from its eponymous social networking platform in October 2021.
Mark Zuckerberg, Meta’s co-founder and CEO, established Facebook in 2004 from his Harvard hostel as a way for students to meet and interact on the internet.
The 19-year-old student had no idea that Facebook would become integral to many people’s social life, with nearly three billion monthly users, and expanding to include popular social media apps Instagram and Whatsapp.
Over the years, his company has injected billions of dollars into the metaverse, a futuristic idea of virtual environments where users can work, socialise and play, by adding new features to hardware devices that serve as access points.
Chief market strategist at National Securities in New York, Art Hogan said: “Companies that change their official name and ticker are usually trying to signal that there has been a fundamental change in the underlying business model.”
“I’m not sure if it really makes much of a big difference. I still call them Google and Facebook,” Hogan added.
This year, Meta shares have fallen over 40 as it battles criticism from parliamentarians and rights groups over its policing of abuses, market power, algorithmic decisions systems.