Meta Beats Q3 Revenue Estimates, Creates Non-Voting Class C Stock, Shares Rise After Hours

META reported third-quarter 2026 revenue of $64.6 billion on October 21, up 26% from a year earlier and ahead of the roughly $63.3 billion consensus. Advertising, still nearly all of the business, brought in $63.1 billion against a $61.8 billion estimate. GAAP earnings were $3.83 per share, and that figure carries a $9.89 billion charge for the settlement Meta reached in August with state attorneys general over teen mental-health litigation. Meta's release says diluted EPS would have been $7.40 without the charge, and the charge also pushed its 2026 total expense outlook up to $175 billion to $179 billion.

The structural headline is a new non-voting Class C common stock. Meta plans to distribute one Class C share for every Class A and Class B share once a restated charter takes effect, which its filing expects around January 19, 2027. This is a stock dividend rather than a formal split, but Meta says it expects the Class A price to reflect the effect of a two-for-one split. Voting power does not change, and the filing lists raising capital, employee compensation and acquisitions among the uses for the new class. As Semafor reported, that gives Meta a way to issue stock for AI spending and deals without diluting Mark Zuckerberg's control. No Class C shares have been sold yet.

On spending, Meta narrowed its 2026 capital expenditure outlook to $135 billion to $145 billion from $130 billion to $145 billion, lifting the low end and leaving the top unchanged. That is closer to a tightening than a raise, which is how some investors read it: "roughly inline with its old CAPEX outlook". Fortune put third-quarter capex at $34.9 billion, up from $19.4 billion a year ago, and free cash flow at negative $2.1 billion.

Fourth-quarter revenue guidance of $73 billion to $76 billion brackets the roughly $73.6 billion analysts expected, with a midpoint above it. Shares rose about 3% in early after-hours trading, and some reports put the move as high as 5%. What to watch: how management frames Class C issuance on the call, whether capex lands near the top of the range, and how much of the $9.89 billion charge recurs as other litigation resolves. This is market analysis, not investment advice.