The dust has settled on the big holiday online shopping period known as the Cyber Five, and Americans appear ready to spend. That's good news for Amazon stock but also offers a positive indicator for digital advertising stocks, including Facebook parent company Meta Platforms, analysts say.
"Advertising is the natural beneficiary from healthy digital consumer spending," JMP Securities analyst Andrew Boone wrote in a client note Wednesday. "With Meta and Google's largest advertising category retail, healthy consumer spending increases our confidence that there is upside to (fourth quarter) advertising estimates."
Meta stock climbed in early trading to an all-time high at 617.78 before easing back in recent action on the stock market today. Shares closed at 613.78, a fraction higher on the day. Meta also announced plans to work with nuclear energy developers late Tuesday.
Meta Stock: $13.3 Billion Spent On Cyber Monday
Online spending on Cyber Monday in the U.S. grew 7.3% year over year to $13.3 billion, according to Adobe Analytics. Overall spending during the five days between Thanksgiving and Monday grew a stronger-than-forecast 8.2% year over year to $41.1 billion, according to Adobe.
The battle for e-commerce retailers such as Amazon and Walmart to reach customers online likely means more ad spending. JMP's Boone cited data from research firm Polar Analytics that found Facebook's ad spend grew 20% year over year during the past week.
JMP rates Meta stock a positive outperform with a price target of 660.
Meanwhile, Oppenheimer analyst Jason Helfstein wrote last week that strong Black Friday spending is "bullish for Amazon and digital advertising overall, particularly for Meta, Google, The Trade Desk and Pinterest."
Amazon stock, meanwhile, gained 2.2% to close at 218.16, also hitting an all-time high. Amazon stock was also likely moved higher by positive response to AI announcements at its annual cloud conference Tuesday.
Google parent Alphabet's stock gained 1.7% to close at 174.37.
Meta Going Nuclear
Separately, Meta late Tuesday published a request for proposals for nuclear energy developers to provide one to four gigawatts of new nuclear generation capacity by the early 2030s.
Meta joins Amazon, Microsoft and Google in seeking to work with nuclear energy companies, as AI applications are expected to ramp up demand for energy from data centers.
"We believe that nuclear energy can help provide firm, baseload power to support the growth needs of the electric grids that power both our data centers (the physical infrastructure on which Meta's platforms operate) as well as the communities around them," Meta said in a blog post.
Meta Stock: Recent Breakout
Meanwhile, Meta broke out of a flat base chart pattern with a 3.5% gain Tuesday, hovering in a buy zone. Shares closed at a record high 613.65 before Meta pushed higher briefly on Wednesday.
Meta was also the IBD Stock of the Day on Friday. Shares slumped in early November after the election of Donald Trump to a second presidential term. Trump has previously called Facebook an "enemy of the people." Meta Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg appears to be trying to patch things up. The Facebook founder visited Trump in Florida last week. Shares are up 7% since the meeting was made public.
Overall, Meta stock has gained 73% this year, following a 194% rally in 2023.
Meta shows a 98 out of a perfect 99 IBD Composite Rating, per IBD Stock Checkup. It is the highest-rated stock out of 69 members in the internet content group tracked by IBD.
