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Facebook parent Meta's shares jumped by 12% today after the firm reported a solid quarter yesterday and smashed analyst revenue and EPS estimates out of the park. During its second quarter, Meta earned $47.52 billion in revenue and $7.14 in earnings per share, which were significantly higher than the analyst estimates of $44.80 billion and $5.92. The firm also guided $47.5 billion to $50.5 billion in revenue for the third quarter, the lower end of which was more than a billion dollars higher than $46.14 billion of analyst estimates. However, while the firm topped up its earnings by also raising the low end of its capital expenditure guidance to $64 billion from an earlier $62 billion, its balance sheet shows that it burned through an unbelievable $32 billion in cash during 2025's first half.
Meta Burns Cash As Mark Zuckerberg Goes Full Throttle On AI Expansion
During Meta's earnings call, CFO Susan Li shared that Meta's capital expenditure in 2025 mark a roughly $30 billion increase over 2024 and added that while "the infrastructure planning process remains highly dynamic, we currently expect another year of similarly significant capex dollar growth in 2026 as we continue aggressively pursuing opportunities to bring additional capacity online to meet the needs of our AI efforts and business operations."
A deeper look at Meta's balance sheet shows that the firm is already absorbing the impact of its AI investments. Not only has Meta been on a spending spree this year, after having spent $14.3 billion to buy ScaleAI and set up its Superintelligence Lab, but CEO Mark Zuckerberg has also pledged hundreds of billions of dollars in investment to build massive AI data centers.
Meta's balance sheet shows that as of June 30th, 2025, the firm had $12 billion in cash and cash equivalents. This marked a stunning 72% drop over the firm's cash position as of December 31st, as the firm spent $32 billion during the first six months of the year. Crucially, during the first quarter, Meta had spent $15 billion, which indicates that its cash burn accelerated during Q2.
A deeper look into the firm's cash flow statement shows that its net cash from operating activities was outpaced by the net cash from investing activities. A cash flow statement measures the tangible inflows and outflows during a quarter, and within it, cash flows for investing show the outflows made by a firm for growth.
During the second quarter, Meta generated $25.6 billion through its operations but ended up spending $26 billion for investment purposes. Within its investment cash outflows, $16.5 billion, or 63%, were for purchases of property and equipment. While Meta did generate $14.2 billion through securities, the firm nevertheless spent $15 billion in equity investments - a charge that likely reflects its investment in ScaleAI.
Over the year-ago quarter, the Q2 investment cash outflows mark a 104% jump. While Meta's stock has gained 29% year-to-date in 2025, it dropped by 64% in 2022 after Zuckerberg burned through tens of billions of dollars in trying to create a metaverse. However, the rise of the AI hype in 2023 allowed the Meta CEO to pivot and court investors by spending billions of dollars on data centers instead.
About the author: Ramish is a seasoned technology writer and editor with more than a decade of experience. He specializes in semiconductor fabrication and market analysis. With a background in finance and supply chain management - via his bachelors in Finance and a micromasters in supply chain management from MIT - Ramish combines financial rigor with deep industry insight to deliver accurate and authoritative coverage.
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