《经济学人》双语：社交平台Meta至暗时刻已过?

原文标题：
Social media
Mark to market
After a torrid 2022, things are looking up for Meta. Is the worst over?
社交媒体
市值调整
艰难的2022年已远去，Meta公司渐有起色。至暗时刻过去了吗？

Is the worst over for Mark Zuckerberg’s social-media empire?
马克·扎克伯格的社交媒体王国至暗时刻结束了吗？

[Paragraph 1]
FOR MARK ZUCKERBERG, the first three quarters of last year were rough.
对于马克·扎克伯格来说，他的公司去年艰难地熬过了前3个季度。

In July 2022 his social-media empire, Meta, announced its first ever year-on-year decline in quarterly revenues. Three months later it reported another.
2022年7月，他的社交平台Meta季报显示营收首次同比下降。3个月后，又一次下降。

Investors sneered at his expensive pivot from a lucrative ads business to the untested realm of the metaverse, on which Mr Zuckerberg was splurging $10bn a year.
扎克伯格进行了核心业务转型，即把利润丰厚的广告业务转到未经测试的元宇宙领域，投资者对这种转型嗤之以鼻，因为他每年在元宇宙领域烧掉了100亿美元。

By November Meta had lost roughly three-fifths of its market value since its peak of $1.1trn in August 2021, when the covid-19 pandemic meant that much of daily life was being lived online. Shortly after he sacked 11,000 people, or 13% of its workforce.
由于新冠疫情，人们大部分时间都在网上度过，2021年8月公司市值达到1.1万亿美元的峰值。但到去年11月，Meta相对峰值已跌去约3/5的市值。不久后，他解雇了1.1万员工，占全员人数13%。

All the while, he has been fending off trustbusters and, in TikTok, a rival that has proved considerably more adept than previous challengers such as Snap or Pinterest at attracting eyeballs—and with them advertising dollars.
一直以来，他一直在躲避反垄断机构的纠缠；还要面对强劲的竞争对手TikTok，它可比Snap或Pinterest等以前的对手更善于吸引大众眼球--这样可以赚广告费。

[Paragraph 2]
On February 1st Mr Zuckerberg reported another decline in sales for the last three months of 2022, of 4.5% year on year. But the drop was smaller than expected.

2月1日，扎克伯格的公司出了业绩报告，2022年最后3个月的销售额再次出现下降，同比下降4.5%。但降幅小于预期。

The company also put out an optimistic forecast for the current quarter, in which it thinks revenue could reach $28.5bn.

公司还对本季度做出了乐观预测，预计营收可能达到285亿美元。

That would be more than in the first three months of 2021, before Apple introduced privacy rules for its iDevices that made it considerably harder for advertisers to track users across the internet.

这将超过2021前三个月的营收。此前，苹果出了iDevices的隐私规则，这使得广告商很难追踪网友的行为习惯。

Costs are coming under control, Mr Zuckerberg promised, and the company would be “be more proactive about cutting projects that aren’t performing or may no longer be as crucial”.

扎克伯格称，成本正在得到控制，公司将“更加积极主动地削减那些没有业绩或不再重要的项目”。

The firms said it would buy back an additional $40bn-worth of shares. To top it off, on the same day a judge in California threw out a lawsuit brought by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to block Meta’s acquisition of Within, a maker of a popular virtual-reality fitness app.
公司称将再回购价值400亿美元的股票。更重要的是，就在同一天，加利福尼亚州的一名法官驳回了联邦贸易委员会（FTC）提起的诉讼。诉讼案是为了阻止Meta收购Within（一家热门虚拟现实健身应用程序制造商）。

[Paragraph 3]
Investors greeted all this with a big “like”.

投资者们给这些利好消息点了一个大大的“赞”。

Meta’s share price, which had already risen by over 70% in the previous three months, leapt by another 20% or so after hours. That would put its market capitalisation at $484bn.

Meta的股价在过去的三个月里上涨幅度超过70%，盘后又上涨了20%左右。这将使其市值达到4840亿美元。

[Paragraph 4]
Can the hot streak last? Mr Zuckerberg has reasons for cautious optimism.

利好消息能否持续？扎克伯格有理由持谨慎乐观态度。

Meta has come up with ways to work around Apple’s privacy settings.

对于苹果隐私设置问题，Meta已有对策。

Its artificial-intelligence capabilities are improving, both in the lab and in the real world—specifically, in the world of Reels, where algorithms for serving up short videos on Facebook and Instagram, Meta’s two profit motors.These are reportedly getting cleverer at creating engagement.

无论是在实验室还是在现实世界，公司的人工智能能力正在提高--特别是在Reels世界，它为Facebook和Instagram（Meta的两大盈利来源）提供短视频算法。据报道，这些平台在想方设法吸引创作者的到来。

TikTok, which is under increasing scrutiny in America, where some politicians are calling for a ban on the popular app.

TikTok在美国面临越来越多审查，一些政客呼吁禁用该软件。

Even Apple has given Mr Zuckerberg’s vision of the metaverse a backhanded compliment, by working on its own virtual-reality-like headset.
甚至苹果公司对扎克伯格的元宇宙愿景大加（言不由衷的）赞赏，苹果也在开发自己的虚拟现实耳机。

[Paragraph 5]

Plenty could still go wrong.

但仍有很多问题。

What used to be recession-proof digital-ad spending is becoming more cyclical, and the economic cycle is turning downwards.

过去数字广告不受经济衰退影响，现在也更加受经济影响，而经济周期正处于下行阶段。

Even if Meta’s Western markets avoid a recession, advertisers are likely to rein in spending.

即使Meta的西方市场躲过了经济衰退，广告商也可能会控制支出。

Despite a degree of bipartisan support for a TikTok ban, political gridlock in Washington makes any actual legislation to that effect unlikely in the near future.

尽管两党都在一定程度上都支持TikTok禁令，但华盛顿的政治僵局一时半会不可能有任何实际的立法。

Its courtroom win over Within notwithstanding, Meta still faces other—more serious—challenges from regulators at home (where another FTC lawsuit calls for its break-up) and in Europe (where tough new rules on large digital platforms are being finalised).

尽管Meta在法庭上可以收购Within，但Meta仍面临其他更严重的挑战--来自国内监管机构（另一场FTC诉讼案要求其破产）和欧洲监管机构（正在就大型数字平台制定严格新规）。

And few people are burning to migrate to the metaverse. Late last year Horizon Worlds, Meta’s main metaversal attraction, was reportedly losing users.

很少有人渴望迁移到元宇宙。去年年底，据报道，Meta的主要元宇宙平台Horizon Worlds用户正在流失。

Mr Zuckerberg is not out of the woods. But he no longer seems lost in the jungle.
虽然扎克伯格还没完全走出困境，但他似乎不再迷茫了。

（恭喜读完，本篇英语词汇量646左右）
原文出自：2023年2月4日《The Economist》Business版块。

精读笔记来源于：自由英语之路

本文翻译整理: Irene本文编辑校对: Irene
仅供个人英语学习交流使用。

【补充资料】（来自于网络）
Mark to Market (MTM)盯市；逐日盯市，代表市值调整。在每个上报数据期限内，如进行季报的月份，根据市值对公司所持有的证券的价值进行测算，并对相应账务进行调整。对保证金、期货交易账户的市值逐日计算的会计程序。

据华尔街日报消息，知情人士透露，一位美国法官拒绝叫停 Meta 收购虚拟现实初创公司 Within 的交易，美国联邦贸易委员会（FTC）阻止该交易失败。也就是美法院批准 Meta 收购 VR 公司 Within。起初FTC 去年 7 月起诉 Meta 要求停止对 Within 的收购，理由是 Meta 自 2014 年收购 Oculus 起便在策划一场“VR 征服运动”。该案于去年 12 月开庭。

Meta旗下Instagram全新推出的Reels短视频功能。Reels是Instagram(以下简称IG)应用程序新增的一项功能，目前已经对超过130个国家/地区开放可用。IG用户可以通过特效，配音和剪辑输出60s视频内容，并将它们分享到他们的动态、故事和 Reels 探索页面。

“Horizon Worlds”是Meta公司推出的元宇宙平台。2021年12月初，元宇宙平台“Horizon Worlds”开放。根据描述，“Horizon Worlds”是一个有趣温馨的虚拟现实世界，多达20个角色可以在其中创建自己的社区、探索、休闲娱乐。但就像现实世界一样，总有一些出人意料的事情会发生。

 
【重点句子】（3 个）
Investors greeted all this with a big “like”.
投资者们给这些利好消息点了一个大大的“赞”。

Can the hot streak last? Mr Zuckerberg has reasons for cautious optimism.
利好消息能否持续？扎克伯格有理由持谨慎乐观态度。

Mr Zuckerberg is not out of the woods. But he no longer seems lost in the jungle.
虽然扎克伯格还没完全走出困境，但他似乎不再迷茫了。