Shares in the company, which owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, fell by more than 10pc as US stock markets opened on Thursday. The drop in Meta’s share price wiped around $20bn from Mr Zuckerberg’s personal fortune.
It came after Meta’s profits were dented by the company’s substantial spending as Mr Zuckerberg pressed ahead with plans to put AI into all of the company’s products. Shares recovered somewhat, trading down 8pc later in the day.
Meta has ploughed billions into AI, hiring top researchers and building data centres in the hope that it can offer “agents” to the company’s billions of users.
Mr Zuckerberg said on Wednesday night: “Soon, we will have agents that can work 24/7 on your behalf to help you achieve your goals and improve your life, your health, your relationships, your finances – whatever you want.”
However, investors have become nervous about the scale and speed of the tech giant’s AI spending, which has so far not delivered a comparable boost to sales.
Meta’s costs in the second quarter of the year rose by 55pc to $42bn, much faster than the 28pc increase in revenues, which rose to $60.8bn. This meant profits fell 14pc to $15.8bn.
Meta said capital expenditures – largely AI infrastructure spending – would be between $130bn and $145bn this year, compared to previous guidance of $125bn to $145bn.
Social media users and other casual internet browsers are yet to pay for AI in significant numbers, with the majority of frequent use in areas such as computer coding.
Analysts said Mr Zuckerberg’s enthusiastic investments risked repeating the mistake of his pricey foray into the “Metaverse” of virtual worlds, which was once seen as the company’s future but is now largely disbanded.