MARK Zuckerberg’s pivot towards the metaverse is off to a rocky start after Meta’s shares plunged more than 20 per cent after unexpected spending on its virtual reality project led to a rare decline in its fourth-quarter profit.

Meta’s – formerly Facebook – fourth-quarter earnings report is the first time the company has shared the financial performance of the augmented and virtual reality part of the business that’s at the heart of its metaverse ambitions.

The AR and VR division reported a net loss of $10.2billion for 2021 as a whole.

This caused shares to plummet by 23 per cent in response, causing a hit of $200billion in market value.

Mr Zuckerberg said: “This fully realised vision is still a ways off.

“And although the direction is clear, our path ahead is not yet perfectly defined.”

He went on to add the company planned to launch a new “high-end” VR headset along with a mobile version of its Horizon VR experience.

Mr Zuckerberg has described the metaverse as a ‘virtual environment’ you can enter instead of just viewing it on a screen.

In theory, it would be a place where people can meet, work and play using smartphone apps, virtual reality headsets, augmented reality glasses, or other devices.

Since Meta changed its name last fall the company has been shifting resources and hiring engineers.

Mark Zuckerberg is betting on the metaverse becoming the next big thing and expects people to start seeing Meta as a metaverse company rather than a social media company in the coming years.

Meta executives expect it to take 15 years to fully meet their vision.

This could be spooking investors, who tend to prefer results on investments.