Widely followed former hedge fund manager and now CNBC personality Jim Cramer coined the term “FANG” a few years back. It was an acronym that was supposed to encapsulate the best that the stock market had to offer — the biggest, most innovative and most exciting technology companies in the world. They were sure-fire, big-growth investments.

The acronym worked because it encompassed the biggest companies in the four most exciting secular growth markets. There was the social media giant in Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB), the e-commerce behemoth in Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN), the internet TV leader in Netflix, Inc. (NASDAQ:NFLX) and the digital search king in Alphabet Inc (NADSAQ:GOOG, NASDAQ:GOOGL).

FANG has worked well for the past several years. But recently, one of the companies in FANG hasn’t held up so well.

Which company might that be? Facebook. Over the past three months, FB stock is up just 5%. NFLX and GOOG stock are each up about 17% in that same time frame. AMZN stock is up more than 30%.

Naturally, questions have started to arise. Why has FB stock underperformed? What does that mean for the entire social media space? And will this trend continue?

Lets take a deep looker at those questions…

Facebook’s Underperformance Is Due to Social Media Struggles

Facebook stock has struggled because social media has come under fire recently.

Multiple reports have surfaced recently that social media usage is actually detrimental to one’s health. The media is taking those reports and running with headlines like “Facebook admits it poses mental health risk”. These reports also come against the backdrop of fake news, the Russian intervention scandal, and inappropriate digital ad placement issues.

Plus, Facebook founder and Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg admitted the other day that too many ads on the Facebook platform are having a detrimental effect on peer-to-peer engagement.

Amid all this negative press, Zuckerberg has decided to a beat this drum that he and Facebook are going to prioritize community security, safety and healthy engagement over profits. This translates into lesser revenue growth (less ads on Facebook), higher operating expenses (more dollars spent on enhancing community safety) and lower profits.

Put that all together, and it’s easy to see why FB stock has underperformed its high-growth tech peers recently. The company is being forced to undergo fundamental business model changes which will adversely impact profits. This naturally depresses investor enthusiasm.

Facebook Stock Will Roar Higher in the Long Term

Although FB stock is down right now, it is far from out. In fact, the operational changes that Facebook is enacting today ensure that the platform has a bright future tomorrow.

If Facebook were to just keep prioritizing profits over everything, engagement would fall off because consumers would be disgusted with ad overload in a fake-news-sensitive environment. If engagement fell, advertisers would pull out, and considering the entire Facebook empire is built on digital advertising dollars, an advertiser exodus would lead to an epic collapse in FB stock.

From this perspective, the only thing for FB to do is prioritize near- and long-term engagement over near-term profits. And the fact that Facebook is doing this at such an early stage means the company is ensuring its long-term success.

Here’s what’s going to happen: Facebook will beat the drum that community safety is more important than profits. It will invest in getting fake news off the site and start decreasing the supply of ad real estate. This will lead to higher engagement, but not lower profits (supply of ad real estate will decrease, but the price of that real estate will increase, because demand isn’t going anywhere).

So near-term financials aren’t really impacted at all. But the narrative surrounding Facebook has changed entirely. All the sudden, they are the good guys trying to pioneer a new era of healthy and safe social media usage. This narrative translates into positive press and higher engagement. Digital advertisers follow engagement. So, as engagement goes up, so do ad dollars. Profits soar.

Overall, Facebook is currently doing everything necessary to ensure that the company has an exceptionally profitable long-term future.

Bottom Line on FB Stock

Recent weakness is an opportunity in FB stock.

Investors buying here will be handsomely rewarded in the long term as Facebook pioneers a new era of healthy and safe social media usage.

As of this writing, Luke Lango was long FB, AMZN, NFLX, and GOOG.