Mark Zuckerberg seems to have stuck the landing at Meta Connect

• Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta Connect keynote impressed Wall Street, boosting Meta’s stock on Wednesday.
• Zuckerberg unveiled new Meta Quest headsets, AI features, and Orion holographic glasses.
• Analysts praised the keynote but noted Orion’s high cost and delayed consumer release.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg needed less than an hour to wow Wall Street.

He took the stage at Meta Connect in a T-shirt dedicated to himself and delivered a keynote that Wall Street seems to be responding well to. In fact, his showing was a “massive flex” for Zuckerberg, according to Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives.

Zuckerberg introduced a new lineup of Meta Quest headsets, some impressive AI features coming to the company’s smart glasses, and gave the public a glimpse of the highly anticipated Orion holographic glasses. He even managed to sneak in one of the many memes about his stylish new look.

Meta’s stock jumped more than 2%, though did even out in the day following his big announcements.

Over the last year or so, Zuckerberg has shown that he’s not the 20-something CEO who burst onto the scene with Facebook anymore. He’s turned 40, stepped up his style, and has morphed into a Meta influencer on Instagram.

His confidence appears to have paid off onstage Wednesday, Stratechery founder Ben Thompson remarked. He compared Zuck’s spirited keynote to that of the late Apple cofounder Steve Jobs.

“I thought Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg delivered one of the best tech keynotes in years,” Thompson wrote.

That’s saying something, considering 2024 has been all about the buzzy events from Big Tech.

Still, Gene Munster, managing partner at Deepwater Asset Management, said on X that Meta’s stock fading after the keynote is likely because Orion is “years away and overall there was not much new from the event.”

And Thompson, who described the holographic glasses as “spectacular,” gave a similar caveat.

“The glasses that I tried felt like a consumer-ready product, but they reportedly cost $10,000 each, and Meta has decided to hold off on shipping a consumer version until they can bring the price down,” Thompson said in a Thursday blog post.

Consumers may not line up for $10,000 glasses, but reactions to Meta’s vision of the future suggest they’re open to a new tech frontier.

A frontier that might include fewer smartphones and more chunky glasses.