Facebook Free-Fallin’
• Shares of Facebook plunged nearly 20 percent in early trading on Thursday, sending the company’s market value plummeting nearly $120 billion in what The Washington Post reports is the largest drop in value in Wall Street history. The news was just as bad for Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, whose personal net worth dropped by around $16 billion with the stock dive, but fear not — he’s still worth around $67 billion, according to Forbes‘ real-time net worth tracker.
The social media giant’s stock drop to its lowest levels in nearly three months, wiped out more than $110 billion in market capitalization for Facebook and dragged down other internet and tech stocks including Twitter and Snap. At the close of business yesterday, shares of Facebook were sitting at $176.26, down $41.24, or 18.96 percent. As MarketWatch reported earlier in the day, “Should the stock close below $176.46, it would mean shares have wiped out their 2018 gains.”
Facebook’s market cap was sitting at $629.6 billion at the close of market on Wednesday, and had fallen to $510 billion late Thursday.
Variety reports Facebook’s daily active users for the second quarter of 2018 were effectively flat in the U.S. sequentially, and even declined in Europe compared with Q1 — marking the first time the company has seen such a decline in recent quarters.
