AI monetization and capex in focus for Meta as Wall Street heads toward Q3 earnings (www.businessinsider.com)

Meta’s Q3 results, due after the market close Wednesday, are being framed as an AI report card: Wall Street expects $49.57B in revenue and $6.72 in EPS, and investors are watching whether AI-driven ad products translate into faster growth and healthier margins. The company has signaled heavy capital intensity — roughly $66–72B in AI hardware spend forecast for 2025 — and recently invested about $14–15B to take a large stake in ScaleAI to accelerate data, labeling and model-development pipelines tied to its “Superintelligence” push. Meta shares are up ~29% YTD as markets reward bold AI bets, but guidance will be critical to sustain that optimism. Analysts say the call will hinge on how effectively Meta is monetizing generative models and infrastructure: Bank of America expects 23% y/y growth (vs. ~13% for Google properties) driven by improved ad targeting, CRM integrations, unified video models and Gen‑AI creative tools; JPMorgan cites Reels/video and AI-ad improvements and flags the Superintelligence unit (which recently cut ~600 jobs); CFRA sees ~21–22% growth and sustained capex. Price targets range from ~$825–900. For the AI/ML community, the event matters because it tests the economics of large-scale model deployment — whether massive hardware investment and data-platform plays can be converted into predictable advertising revenue and margin expansion.