South Dakota Investment Council Acquires 7,141 Shares of Salesforce Inc. $CRM

South Dakota Investment Council grew its holdings in Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) by 93.6% during the first quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm owned 14,769 shares of the CRM provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 7,141 shares during the quarter. South Dakota Investment Council’s holdings in Salesforce were worth $2,757,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in the business. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 0.3% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 89,843,166 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $23,800,353,000 after purchasing an additional 270,913 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp increased its stake in Salesforce by 1.3% in the 4th quarter. State Street Corp now owns 50,080,230 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $13,286,909,000 after buying an additional 659,573 shares during the period. J. Stern & Co. LLP lifted its holdings in Salesforce by 24,056.7% during the 4th quarter. J. Stern & Co. LLP now owns 47,385,511 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $12,552,896,000 after buying an additional 47,189,352 shares in the last quarter. Capital International Investors boosted its position in Salesforce by 13.3% in the 4th quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 22,721,010 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $6,019,199,000 after buying an additional 2,669,891 shares during the period. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its position in Salesforce by 3.8% in the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 21,782,556 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $5,751,073,000 after buying an additional 791,345 shares during the period. 80.43% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities analysts have recently commented on the stock. Piper Sandler lowered shares of Salesforce from an “overweight” rating to a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, May 28th. Wedbush initiated coverage on Salesforce in a report on Wednesday, July 1st. They issued an “outperform” rating for the company. Guggenheim upgraded Salesforce from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $228.00 price target for the company in a report on Wednesday, July 1st. BMO Capital Markets dropped their price objective on Salesforce from $225.00 to $215.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, May 28th. Finally, HC Wainwright lowered Salesforce to a “negative” rating in a research report on Thursday, June 18th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-four have issued a Buy rating, sixteen have given a Hold rating and four have given a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $249.51.

Salesforce Trading Down 3.9%

NYSE:CRM opened at $180.95 on Friday. The firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $170.26 and a 200-day simple moving average of $185.02. Salesforce Inc. has a one year low of $146.32 and a one year high of $269.11. The firm has a market cap of $148.20 billion, a P/E ratio of 20.94, a P/E/G ratio of 1.02 and a beta of 1.18. 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 (NYSE:CRM) last released its quarterly earnings data 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 for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $11.05 billion. Salesforce had a net margin of 18.73% and a return on equity of 18.72%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 13.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm 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 fiscal year.

Salesforce Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, July 2nd. Shareholders of record on Thursday, June 11th were given a dividend of $0.44 per share. This represents a $1.76 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.0%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, June 11th. Salesforce’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 20.37%.

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.