122,091 Salesforce Inc. $CRM Shares Sold by Eurizon Capital SGR S.p.A.

Eurizon Capital SGR S.p.A. lowered its stake in shares of Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) by 33.7% in the third quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 239,920 shares of the CRM provider’s stock after selling 122,091 shares during the period. Eurizon Capital SGR S.p.A.’s holdings in Salesforce were worth $54,868,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also bought and sold shares of the stock. PBU The Pension Fund of Early Childhood & Youth Educators increased its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 9.4% in the 3rd quarter. PBU The Pension Fund of Early Childhood & Youth Educators now owns 151,960 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $34,885,000 after acquiring an additional 13,110 shares during the period. Van Strum & Towne Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 5.4% in the 3rd quarter. Van Strum & Towne Inc. now owns 25,583 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $5,873,000 after buying an additional 1,313 shares in the last quarter. Three Bridge Wealth Advisors LLC purchased a new position in shares of Salesforce in the 3rd quarter worth approximately $129,000. CFM Wealth Partners LLC purchased a new position in shares of Salesforce in the 3rd quarter worth approximately $274,000. Finally, Maryland State Retirement & Pension System raised its stake in shares of Salesforce by 13.3% during the 3rd quarter. Maryland State Retirement & Pension System now owns 48,789 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $11,200,000 after acquiring an additional 5,728 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of research firms recently commented on CRM. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their target price on shares of Salesforce from $250.00 to $265.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 27th. Jefferies Financial Group reiterated a “buy” rating on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Tuesday, October 20th. Wells Fargo & Company lowered shares of Salesforce from a “buy” rating to a “strong sell” rating in a report on Monday, October 12th. CLSA assumed coverage on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Monday, July 20th. They issued a “hold” rating and a $165.00 target price for the company. Finally, Wall Street Zen lowered shares of Salesforce from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Saturday, August 1st. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-two have given a Buy rating, thirteen have given a Hold rating and three have assigned a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Salesforce currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $278.98.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, Director David Blair Kirk purchased 4,176 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, September 18th. The shares were bought at an average cost of $239.33 per share, for a total transaction of $999,442.08. Following the completion of the purchase, the director directly owned 18,748 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,486,958.84. This trade represents a 28.66% increase in their ownership of the stock. The purchase was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, Director Craig Conway sold 4,500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, September 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $260.61, for a total value of $1,172,745.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director owned 5,437 shares in the company, valued at $1,416,936.57. This represents a 45.29% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. 3.50% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Salesforce Trading Up 0.0%

Shares of CRM stock opened at $217.66 on Friday. Salesforce Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $146.32 and a fifty-two week high of $269.11. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.02, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a current ratio of 0.84. The stock’s fifty day moving average is $235.27 and its two-hundred day moving average is $198.36. The firm has a market capitalization of $179.13 billion, a P/E ratio of 19.84, a PEG ratio of 0.99 and a beta of 1.24.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, August 26th. The CRM provider reported $5.90 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.27 by $2.63. The business had revenue of $11.35 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $11.33 billion. Salesforce had a net margin of 21.99% and a return on equity of 24.90%. The business’s revenue was up 10.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the company posted $2.91 EPS. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 16.670-16.710 EPS and its Q3 2027 guidance at 3.420-3.440 EPS. Research analysts expect that Salesforce Inc. will post 12.82 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Salesforce Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, October 8th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, September 17th were issued a dividend of $0.44 per share. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, September 17th. This represents a $1.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.8%. Salesforce’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 16.04%.

Salesforce Profile

Salesforce, Inc. is a cloud-based software company best known for customer relationship management (CRM) tools. Its platform helps businesses manage sales, customer service, marketing, commerce and customer data, and includes products such as Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Data Cloud and Agentforce. The company also offers Slack for workplace collaboration, Tableau for data analytics and visualization, and MuleSoft for connecting applications and data. Salesforce’s products are used by organizations across a range of industries and are available to customers around the world.