Meta stock surges after Q2 results beat expectations despite heavy AI spending
The California-based company earned 18.34 billion dollars in the April-June period. That is up 36% from 13.47 billion dollars in the same period a year earlier.
Revenue jumped 22% to 47.52 billion dollars from 39.07 billion dollars.
Meta said it expects costs to increase as it spends billions on infrastructure and luring highly compensated employees as it works on its artificial intelligence ambitions.
It is forecasting 2025 expenses to be in the range of 114 billion dollars to 118 billion dollars, up 20% to 24% year-over-year.
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Scottish Sun
32 minutes ago
- Scottish Sun
High street card retailer with 160 branches to shut another store and launches closing down sale
We reveal how the retailer continues to struggle on the high street below CLOSING TIME High street card retailer with 160 branches to shut another store and launches closing down sale Click to share on X/Twitter (Opens in new window) Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) A MAJOR high street card retailer and well-known brand is shutting another store as a closing down sale is launched. Clintons is pulling down the shutters on its branch in the Middleton Grange Shopping Centre, Hartlepool, in a matter of weeks. Sign up for Scottish Sun newsletter Sign up 1 Clintons is closing a branch in Hartlepool later this month Credit: Getty An employee working for the retailer confirmed the branch will shut on August 16. The branch has also reportedly launched a closing down sale with up to 30% off stock. Shoppers and locals reacting to the closure on Facebook have branded Hartlepool a "ghost town". The closure comes after Clintons shut a string of shops across the UK. A branch shut in Keighley in June with stock reduced by up to 20%, while two others closed in Halifax and Andover in April. Clintons, now owned by Pillarbox Designs, the parent company of Cardzone, warned of further closures in April due to rising employer National Insurance contributions and the national minimum wage. The rate of employer NICs was hiked from 13.8% to 15% and the threshold at which they are paid lowered from £9,100 to £5,000 in April. The national minimum wage was also increased by up to £12.21 a hour. The warning came despite Clintons posting a return to profits in its latest results, with a pre-tax profit of £8million for the year ending June 29, 2024. A statement from the retailer in April said: "The high street continues to be unpredictable and the company is seeing reduced footfall in the stores year on year. Britain's retail apocalypse: why your favourite stores KEEP closing down "The company continues to monitor the performance of the existing estate and to close the poor performing stores, which, whilst impacting on turnover, should improve profitability moving forwards." Clintons currently operates over 160 stores in the UK but at one point boasted more than 1,000. In 2023, it announced plans to close 38 of its then 225 stores to the loss of over 300 jobs. Clintons was contacted for comment. Trouble on the high street It is no secret the high street has struggled in recent years, due to a combination of factors. Shoppers are buying online considerably more than they were before, while retailers have faced higher rental, wage and energy costs. Some big names have announced mass store closures in 2025, including Poundland, Hobbycraft and The Original Factory Shop. The Centre for Retail Research says the sector has been going through a "permacrisis" since the 2008 financial crash. Figures from the Centre also show 34 retail companies operating multiple stores stopped trading in 2024, leading to the closure of 7,537 shops. Businesses have cautioned more closures are to be expected this year as well due to the hike to employer NICs and staff wages. RETAIL PAIN IN 2025 The British Retail Consortium predicted that the Treasury's hike to employer NICs will cost the retail sector £2.3billion. Research by the British Chambers of Commerce showed that more than half of companies planned to raise prices by early April. A survey of more than 4,800 firms also found that 55% expect prices to increase in the next three months, up from 39% in a similar poll conducted in the latter half of 2024. Three-quarters of companies cited the cost of employing people as their primary financial pressure. The Centre for Retail Research (CRR) has also warned that around 17,350 retail sites are expected to shut down this year. It comes on the back of a tough 2024 when 13,000 shops closed their doors for good, already a 28% increase on the previous year. Professor Joshua Bamfield, director of the CRR said: "The results for 2024 show that although the outcomes for store closures overall were not as poor as in either 2020 or 2022, they are still disconcerting, with worse set to come in 2025." Professor Bamfield has also warned of a bleak outlook for 2025, predicting that as many as 202,000 jobs could be lost in the sector. "By increasing both the costs of running stores and the costs on each consumer's household it is highly likely that we will see retail job losses eclipse the height of the pandemic in 2020. Do you have a money problem that needs sorting? Get in touch by emailing money-sm@ Plus, you can join our Sun Money Chats and Tips Facebook group to share your tips and stories
Daily Mail
33 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
How to ensure your home sells fast
Selling your home can be a headache - from finding a real estate agent, to listing the property, and finding somewhere else to live, many sellers may be wondering where to even start. The truth is - you don't need a degree or copious amounts of cash to prepare your home for the market. Joey Bordi, the senior designer and project manager for City Real Estate, a firm based in San Francisco, California , spoke exclusively with Daily Mail, revealing the easy and even free tips that sellers can do to get their home in tip-top shape. As a designer and project manager, Bordi (pictured) works with real estate agents to prep their listings to reach maximum value. He said one of the worst mistakes sellers can make is keeping their home hyper-personalized, making it impossible for a buyer to envision themselves there. 'Your home is your safe space and you should live in your home how you want to, but when you're going to sell it, it really needs to be palatable to the widest reach of buyers,' he said. Bordi advised keeping the home as empty as possible and sticking to a neutral color palette so that potential buyers can envision themselves living in the space. He gave the example of a green couch - someone may love the concept of a bold color for their sofa, but if a potential buyer hates green, that may be all they remember from the viewing. 'If it's a neutral palette - it's aspirational living,' Bordi explained. Keeping the décor simple so that buyers can picture their own style and furniture in the space can help them envision themselves living there. Personalized decorations, including family photos, kids' drawings, and unique styles, make potential buyers feel like they're walking into someone else's home instead of seeing their future home. 'Buyers don't want to feel like they're intruding on your family memories,' Bordi advised. 'Think model home, not a walk down memory lane.' Staying true to the bones Bordi cautioned that there isn't a one-size-fits-all for prepping your home, and sellers can best maximize their property's value by staying true to its architecture. Selecting a design that meshes well with the home's style makes it more cohesive. Modern finishes and designs may look amazing in a contemporary home, but can be an eyesore in an older house. Painting everything white may be the first instinct when making a home more versatile; however, it can hide certain homes that have unique character. 'If you have beautiful woodwork, paint the walls white, but don't paint the trims and the moldings,' Bordi said. 'We always leave those untouched and give that option to the new buyer.' The designer also warned against black finishes. It may seem like an easy way to update a space, but it can be a mistake. 'Black is a timeless finish. But I think it could go wrong really fast if it's done incorrectly,' Bordi said. 'Just because something's new and trendy, it might not work in your classic home or your hyper-modern home.' Sleek, modern styles have become a popular trend in interior design. Minimalist decorations, glossy furnishings, and sharp lines have recently risen to prominence. However, Bordi said the trend is on the decline and more sellers are opting not to decorate traditional spaces with hyper-modern furniture. He explained that the design is great for certain clients, but doesn't appeal to the masses. A space needs to invite potential buyers, and modern pieces may deter certain individuals from envisioning themselves in the space. More expensive isn't always better Bordi emphasized that opting for the more expensive improvement won't always pay off in the long run. He explained that picking materials for a home remodel should match the home's value. If the materials outvalue the home and the buyer doesn't like the renovation, it could end up being a waste of money for the seller. Bordi clarified that multi-million-dollar homes should have high-quality materials to match their worth, but modest homes don't need that level of investment. If a homeowner wants to renovate a home to live in it forever, Bordi advised going all out, but those who are planning to sell should purchase materials modestly. The designer revealed that two of the biggest mistakes he sees sellers make are focusing on the wrong areas and spending too much money. 'Kitchens and baths sell homes,' Bordi emphasized, adding that these areas should be the homeowner's primary focus when preparing their homes to sell at maximum value. Picking a realtor It may seem like the hard work is done once a home is in tip-top shape, but it's just getting started. Finding a realtor to put a home on the market is no easy feat. Bordi said that the first red flag homeowners should look for when choosing a realtor is a 'yes man'. He cautioned that the best agent will be honest about the improvements that need to be made instead of promising off the bat that the home will sell. Bordi also pushed homeowners to do their research and meet with multiple brokers and compare notes. If three experts say your kitchen needs a renovation, your kitchen needs a renovation, he said. Lastly, and perhaps most simply, he said to tap into your network, reach out to friends, colleagues, and family members for recommendations on the best agents.
The Guardian
2 hours ago
- The Guardian
Big tech has spent $155bn on AI this year. It's about to spend hundreds of billions more
The US's largest companies have spent 2025 locked in a competition to spend more money than one another, lavishing $155bn on the development of artificial intelligence, more than the US government has spent on education, training, employment and social services in the 2025 fiscal year so far. Based on the most recent financial disclosures of Silicon Valley's biggest players, the race is about to accelerate to hundreds of billions in a single year. Over the past two weeks, Meta, Microsoft, Amazon, and Alphabet, Google's parent, have shared their quarterly public financial reports. Each disclosed that their year-to-date capital expenditure, a figure that refers to the money companies spend to acquire or upgrade tangible assets, already totals tens of billions. Capex, as the term is abbreviated, is a proxy for technology companies' spending on AI because the technology requires gargantuan investments in physical infrastructure, namely data centers, which require large amounts of power, water and expensive semiconductor chips. Google said during its most recent earnings call that its capital expenditure 'primarily reflects investments in servers and data centers to support AI'. Meta's year-to-date capital expenditure amounted to $30.7bn, doubling the $15.2bn figure from the same time last year, per its earnings report. For the most recent quarter alone, the company spent $17bn on capital expenditures, also double the same period in 2024, $8.5bn. Alphabet reported nearly $40bn in capex to date for the first two quarters of the current fiscal year, and Amazon reported $55.7bn. Microsoft said it would spend more than $30bn in the current quarter to build out the data centers powering its AI services. Microsoft CFO Amy Hood said the current quarter's capex would be at least 50% more than the outlay during the same period a year earlier and greater than the company's record capital expenditures of $24.2bn in the quarter to June. 'We will continue to invest against the expansive opportunity ahead,' Hood said. For the coming fiscal year, big tech's total capital expenditure is slated to balloon enormously, surpassing the already eye-popping sums of the previous year. Microsoft plans to unload about $100bn on AI in the next fiscal year, CEO Satya Nadella said Wednesday. Meta plans to spend between $66bn and $72bn. Alphabet plans to spend $85bn, significantly higher than its previous estimation of $75bn. Amazon estimated that its 2025 expenditure would come to $100bn as it plows money into Amazon Web Services, which analysts now expect to amount to $118bn. In total, the four tech companies will spend more than $400bn on capex in the coming year, according to the Wall Street Journal. The multibillion-dollar figures represent mammoth investments, which the Journal points out is larger than the European Union's quarterly spending on defense. However, the tech giants can't seem to spend enough for their investors. Microsoft, Google and Meta informed Wall Street analysts last quarter that their total capex would be higher than previously estimated. In the case of all three companies, investors were thrilled, and shares in each company soared after their respective earnings calls. Microsoft's market capitalization hit $4tn the day after its report. Even Apple, the cagiest of the tech giants, signaled that it would boost its spending on AI in the coming year by a major amount, either via internal investments or acquisitions. The company's quarterly capex rose to $3.46bn, up from $2.15bn during the same period last year. The iPhone maker reported blockbuster earnings Thursday, with rebounding iPhone sales and better-than-expected business in China, but it is still seen as lagging farthest behind on development and deployment of AI products among the tech giants. Tim Cook, Apple's CEO, said Thursday that the company was reallocating a 'fair number' of employees to focus on artificial intelligence and that the 'heart of our AI strategy' is to increase investments and 'embed' AI across all of its devices and platforms. Cook refrained from disclosing exactly how much Apple is spending, however. Sign up to TechScape A weekly dive in to how technology is shaping our lives after newsletter promotion 'We are significantly growing our investment, I'm not putting specific numbers behind that,' he said. Smaller players are trying to keep up with the incumbents' massive spending and capitalize on the gold rush. OpenAI announced at the end of the week of earnings that it had raised $8.3bn in investment, part of a planned $40bn round of funding, valuing the startup, whose ChatGPT chatbot kicked in 2022, at $300bn.
