Meta stock went down 26% on Thursday after Facebook’s earnings report was published. A historic drop in the stock price has wiped more than $230bn of company market value, making it the biggest one-day loss in the history of the company.

Why did the drop in value happen?

Meta’s drop in value comes amid concerns about its future after the company posted its first-ever fall in daily user numbers in the Q4 earnings report. The social network's daily active users fell from 1.93 billion in the third quarter of 2021 to 1.929 billion in the fourth.

Facebook also warned of slowing revenue growth in the face of competition from rivals like TikTok and YouTube, while advertisers are also cutting spending.

The company rebranded to Meta last year as part of its strategy to become a virtual-reality based company. The company is looking past its current businesses, such as Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, and toward the metaverse, a virtual world based on new technology.