Bill Ackman makes $2B gamble on Mark Zuckerberg's AI pivot with massive Meta stock purchase
Billionaire investor and hedge fund manager Bill Ackman is making a big gamble on the future of Mark Zuckerberg and his Meta platforms.
Ackman has allegedly committed an estimated $2 billion to Meta, representing a sizable 10% of Pershing Square’s total portfolio, The Wall Street Journal reported. The move is a public backing of Zuckerberg’s pivot from the "Metaverse" to superintelligence, with Meta as the beneficiary of AI integration.
Pershing Square started buying Meta last November at an average price of $625 per share. Today, Meta stock trades near $670, netting Ackman an early gain.
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While Ackman’s investment shows a bullish stance, Meta’s balance sheet has some market experts nervous. Meta’s "Reality Labs" has lost $83 billion since 2020, and the company cut 1,500, or 10%, of Reality Labs’ workforce last month.
Meta is shifting focus away from its virtual reality endeavors to AI-powered smart glasses, which Zuckerberg believes will be the "main way we integrate superintelligence into daily life."
Neither Pershing Square nor Meta immediately returned Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
The Facebook and Instagram parent company is also entering a period of unprecedented capital expenditure to build data centers and talent pools needed for artificial intelligence. Meta’s fourth quarter and full-year 2025 report, released last month, shows the company expects to spend $115 billion to $135 billion in 2026, primarily on front-loading artificial intelligence infrastructure.
Meta stock has declined over the past several months and remains lower year over year, according to market data, amid investor concerns that its artificial intelligence spending may be too aggressive. But in Pershing Square’s investor presentation, Ackman called the stock "deeply discounted."
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Ackman isn’t just betting on Meta, but rather positioning himself as a major stakeholder in America’s future tech economy. Pershing Square has an additional $2 billion stake in Uber and a $1.3 billion stake in Amazon.
Pershing Square also announced Wednesday that it was entirely exiting its position in Hilton, signaling another move away from traditional hospitality toward high-growth technology.