In the second quarter of 2026, Meta achieved revenues of $60.801 billion, representing an impressive 28% year-over-year increase. The company attributes this growth to the accelerated deployment of artificial intelligence across its platforms, a factor Mark Zuckerberg has identified as the true engine driving its business performance. However, the company is also experiencing a period of significant investments and operating costs. Total costs and expenses surged 55% to $42.026 billion, partly due to $2.4 billion in legal costs and $1.18 billion in severance payments following the May workforce reductions. As a result of these extraordinary charges and substantial investments in technology infrastructure, net income fell 14% to $15.848 billion. Furthermore, free cash flow fell to $784 million, a huge drop compared to the previous year, due to the massive infrastructure investment the company is undertaking to shift towards AI. All of this caused the markets to punish its stock value, with a drop of nearly 9% in just 24 hours. Despite these adjustments, the tech company's forecasts remain moderately optimistic, projecting revenues of between $61 billion and $64 billion for the next quarter. A social media group with 3.6 billion users In general, the non-financial indicators presented by Meta are excellent. On the one hand, ad impressions across its family of apps (Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger) increased by 14%. On the other hand, the average price per ad increased by 12% compared to last year. If you add to that the fact that its daily active user base has already reached 3.6 billion people globally (a 3% year-over-year increase), it's clear that Zuckerberg's team has reason to be optimistic. Right now, and despite the voices that have been predicting the decline of its power in the sector for years, the social networks with the most users in the world are owned by Meta: Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. It's clear that the growth of its user base is very slow (remember that it recently declined for the first time in its history), but it remains so dominant compared to the other alternatives that it's difficult to imagine it being overtaken in the short term. This power is also reflected in the geographical distribution of the business, which is, as we mentioned, clearly global. The United States and Canada remain Meta's largest market, generating $26.816 billion in quarterly revenue (+32%), while Europe (+24%), Asia-Pacific (+19%), and the rest of the world (+36%) also saw strong growth. With these results, Meta aims for continued robust growth in its advertising business. The difference compared to previous years is that Zuckerberg is now presenting artificial intelligence as the foundation of a new line of products and services intended to become the company's next major growth engine. All of this is based on a lengthy presentation, which we've summarized for you in this other article: Zuckerberg's New Meta: AI Agents, Smart Glasses, and a Business Far Beyond Advertising.