D.A. Davidson & CO. Lowers Stake in Salesforce Inc. $CRM

D.A. Davidson & CO. lowered its position in Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) by 32.3% during the first quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 39,088 shares of the CRM provider’s stock after selling 18,653 shares during the quarter. D.A. Davidson & CO.’s holdings in Salesforce were worth $7,297,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in the company. Commonwealth Retirement Investments LLC acquired a new stake in Salesforce during the 4th quarter worth about $25,000. Board of the Pension Protection Fund purchased a new stake in shares of Salesforce during the fourth quarter worth about $26,000. Key Capital Management INC acquired a new stake in Salesforce during the 4th quarter worth $26,000. Gilpin Wealth Management LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Salesforce in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $26,000. Finally, Legacy Bridge LLC acquired a new stake in Salesforce during the fourth quarter worth about $27,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Salesforce Trading Down 0.9%

NYSE CRM opened at $171.20 on Friday. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $170.64 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $191.20. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.15, a quick ratio of 0.79 and a current ratio of 0.79. Salesforce Inc. has a twelve month low of $146.32 and a twelve month high of $274.00. The stock has a market cap of $140.21 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.82, a PEG ratio of 0.93 and a beta of 1.18.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, May 27th. The CRM provider reported $3.88 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.13 by $0.75. The firm had revenue of $11.13 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $11.05 billion. Salesforce had a net margin of 18.73% and a return on equity of 18.72%. The company’s revenue was up 13.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $2.58 earnings per share. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 14.060-14.120 EPS and its Q2 2027 guidance at 3.250-3.270 EPS. Equities analysts anticipate that Salesforce Inc. will post 10.29 EPS for the current year.

Salesforce Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, July 2nd. Stockholders of record on Thursday, June 11th were paid a $0.44 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, June 11th. This represents a $1.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.0%. Salesforce’s payout ratio is 20.37%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of analysts have issued reports on CRM shares. Sanford C. Bernstein cut their price target on shares of Salesforce from $194.00 to $173.00 and set an “underperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, May 28th. HC Wainwright downgraded shares of Salesforce to a “negative” rating in a report on Thursday, June 18th. BTIG Research reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $255.00 price target on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Tuesday, May 26th. TD Cowen reissued a “buy” rating on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Friday, June 12th. Finally, Wolfe Research cut shares of Salesforce from an “outperform” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 1st. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-seven have assigned a Buy rating, fourteen have given a Hold rating and three have given a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, Salesforce has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $254.42.

Salesforce Company Profile

Salesforce, founded in 1999 and headquartered in San Francisco, is a global provider of cloud-based software focused on customer relationship management (CRM) and enterprise applications. The company popularized the software-as-a-service (SaaS) model for CRM and has built a broad portfolio of products designed to help organizations manage sales, service, marketing, commerce and analytics through a unified, cloud-first platform.

Core offerings include Sales Cloud for sales automation, Service Cloud for customer support, Marketing Cloud for digital marketing and engagement, and Commerce Cloud for e-commerce.