Salesforce Inc. $CRM Stake Lifted by Fisher Asset Management LLC

Fisher Asset Management LLC grew its holdings in Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) by 11.9% in the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 4,288,199 shares of the CRM provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 455,946 shares during the quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC owned approximately 0.52% of Salesforce worth $984,442,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other large investors have also modified their holdings of the company. BlackRock Inc. bought a new position in shares of Salesforce during the second quarter valued at approximately $11,396,844,000. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership raised its stake in Salesforce by 130.2% in the first quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 12,659,217 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $2,363,096,000 after buying an additional 7,160,302 shares in the last quarter. Bank of America Corp DE bought a new position in Salesforce in the second quarter worth approximately $1,914,086,000. Legal & General Group Plc purchased a new stake in Salesforce during the second quarter worth $927,332,000. Finally, Bank of New York Mellon Corp bought a new stake in Salesforce during the 2nd quarter valued at $844,928,000. Institutional investors own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research analysts have recently commented on CRM shares. Zacks Research raised Salesforce from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, November 3rd. Mizuho raised their price objective on Salesforce from $265.00 to $280.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, September 16th. Jefferies Financial Group reiterated a “buy” rating on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Tuesday, October 20th. Sanford C. Bernstein reiterated an “outperform” rating on shares of Salesforce in a report on Thursday, August 27th. Finally, Yorkville Ives assumed coverage on shares of Salesforce in a research report on Monday, October 5th. They set an “outperform” rating and a $290.00 price target for the company. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-two have issued a Buy rating, thirteen have assigned a Hold rating and three have given a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Salesforce presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $278.98.

Salesforce Stock Down 0.3%

NYSE:CRM opened at $217.38 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 0.84, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.02. Salesforce Inc. has a twelve month low of $146.32 and a twelve month high of $269.11. The company has a market cap of $178.91 billion, a PE ratio of 19.82, a P/E/G ratio of 0.99 and a beta of 1.24. The company’s 50 day moving average is $236.19 and its two-hundred day moving average is $198.42.

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

Salesforce Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, October 8th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, September 17th were issued a $0.44 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend 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 is currently 16.04%.

Insider Transactions at Salesforce

In related news, Director Craig Conway sold 4,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, September 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $260.61, for a total value of $1,172,745.00. Following 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 ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, Director David Blair Kirk purchased 4,176 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, September 18th. The stock was acquired at an average price of $239.33 per share, for a total transaction of $999,442.08. Following the acquisition, the director owned 18,748 shares in the company, valued at $4,486,958.84. This trade represents a 28.66% increase in their position. The disclosure for this purchase is available in the SEC filing. 3.50% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

About Salesforce

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.