Meta’s Stock Jumps 7% Following Early Release of Muse Spark AI Model

TLDR

• Shares of Meta climbed roughly 7% following the early launch of its new artificial intelligence model, Muse Spark
• Muse Spark offers built-in multimodal reasoning, tool-use support, and multi-agent orchestration capabilities
• Analysts from Mizuho, William Blair, and BofA all retained their bullish ratings on Meta after the launch
• The average Wall Street price target for Meta sits at $862.05, indicating around 41% potential upside
• Meta spent nine months rebuilding its pretraining infrastructure, achieving comparable capabilities with far less computing power than its prior model

(SeaPRwire) –   Meta Platforms surprised markets on Wednesday with an earlier-than-planned release of Muse Spark, the first AI model from its newly established Meta Superintelligence Labs. The stock closed trading up roughly 7% at $612.42.

$META has rolled out Muse Spark, its first AI model after Zuckerberg’s multibillion-dollar AI investment push. This closed model will power a more advanced Meta AI with more personalized, visual responses across Facebook, Instagram, and Threads. pic.twitter.com/D6Dm5q9uTg

— Wall St Engine (@wallstengine) April 8, 2026

The launch comes just weeks ahead of Meta’s April 29 earnings call, giving investors a concrete update to evaluate ahead of the company’s financial results.

Muse Spark is the first model in Meta’s Muse family of AI models. It supports native multimodal reasoning, tool use, visual chain of thought, and multi-agent orchestration. It is available on meta.ai and the Meta AI app, with a private API preview open to a select group of users.

Meta Platforms, Inc., META

Meta also rolled out a feature called Contemplating mode, which runs reasoning across multiple AI agents at the same time. The model scored 58% on Humanity’s Last Exam and 38% on FrontierScience Research.

The company spent nine months rebuilding its pretraining stack, upgrading model architecture, optimization processes, and data curation. Meta says it reached comparable capabilities using over 10 times less computing power than its prior model, Llama 4 Maverick.

Muse Spark also includes health-focused capabilities. Meta collaborated with more than 1,000 physicians to build training data for health-related queries. The model can generate interactive displays covering topics like nutritional content and muscle activation during exercise.

For safety standards, Meta ran evaluations under its Advanced AI Scaling Framework. Muse Spark demonstrated strong refusal behavior across high-risk categories including biological and chemical weapons. Third-party evaluator Apollo Research flagged it as having the highest rate of evaluation awareness among all models the firm has tested.

Analysts Back the Move

Lloyd Walmsley of Mizuho retained his Outperform rating and $850 price target. He said the early launch shows tangible AI progress, and pointed to shopping and search features as potential new revenue drivers. He noted investors still want a clearer picture of how Meta will convert AI investments into actual returns.

Ralph Schackart of William Blair also held his Outperform rating. He said the launch can ease lingering concerns about Meta’s AI development timeline, and future model updates will help gauge the return on AI spending. He sees meaningful opportunity in business AI and shopping tools.

Justin Post of BofA reiterated his Buy rating with an $885 price target. He said the early release removes some uncertainty around Meta’s AI roadmap. He drew a parallel to Alphabet, noting that consistent AI progress tends to lift investor sentiment over time. Post also called Meta’s valuation reasonable given the strength of its advertising business.

What Wall Street Thinks

Over the past three months, Meta has earned a Strong Buy consensus on Wall Street, with 39 Buy ratings, six Hold ratings, and zero Sell ratings from tracked analysts.

The average analyst price target stands at $862.05, representing roughly 41% upside from Wednesday’s closing price.