Vaughan Nelson Investment Management L.P. Sells 488,299 Shares of Microsoft Corporation $MSFT

Vaughan Nelson Investment Management L.P. lowered its position in shares of Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) by 99.1% in the first quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 4,205 shares of the software giant’s stock after selling 488,299 shares during the period. Vaughan Nelson Investment Management L.P.’s holdings in Microsoft were worth $1,557,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in MSFT. Longfellow Investment Management Co. LLC grew its position in Microsoft by 51.3% during the 2nd quarter. Longfellow Investment Management Co. LLC now owns 59 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $29,000 after acquiring an additional 20 shares during the last quarter. Bernzott Capital Advisors bought a new position in Microsoft in the 4th quarter valued at $34,000. Timmons Wealth Management LLC bought a new position in Microsoft in the 4th quarter valued at $36,000. Fairway Wealth LLC boosted its stake in Microsoft by 287.0% in the fourth quarter. Fairway Wealth LLC now owns 89 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $43,000 after purchasing an additional 66 shares in the last quarter. Finally, LSV Asset Management acquired a new position in Microsoft in the fourth quarter worth $44,000. 71.13% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Key Headlines Impacting Microsoft

Here are the key news stories impacting Microsoft this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Microsoft continues to secure new enterprise AI and cloud partnerships, including expanded collaborations around Microsoft 365 Copilot and Azure, which support its long-term AI monetization story.
• Positive Sentiment: Microsoft’s 20-year power agreement tied to its Texas data-center buildout helps de-risk AI infrastructure expansion and supports cloud capacity growth.
• Positive Sentiment: ICON plc selected Microsoft as a preferred technology partner, reinforcing demand for Microsoft’s AI and productivity tools in healthcare and enterprise workflows.
• Neutral Sentiment: Analysts and market commentators remain split: some still view Microsoft as a high-quality AI platform with strong long-term upside, while others say the stock has been oversold and may be approaching a valuation reset.
• Neutral Sentiment: Microsoft was also named in multiple new or ongoing lawsuits and class-action notices tied to alleged securities issues and copyright claims involving AI training data, adding headline risk but no immediate operating impact yet.
• Negative Sentiment: Stifel cut its price target on Microsoft and said Wall Street’s gross-margin expectations may be too high as Azure growth and AI capex pressure cloud profitability.
• Negative Sentiment: Microsoft’s Xbox price hikes and repeated gaming price increases suggest hardware cost inflation is squeezing a business line that had already been weakening.
• Negative Sentiment: Investor concern over heavy AI spending, shrinking free cash flow, and lower cloud-margin expectations is weighing on sentiment and helping explain why MSFT is falling.
• Negative Sentiment: EU regulators said Microsoft Azure may face stricter “gatekeeper” rules under the Digital Markets Act, raising the possibility of more compliance burden and oversight in Europe.
• Negative Sentiment: Microsoft’s quantum-computing claims also came under renewed criticism, which adds to skepticism around some of its more speculative AI-related initiatives.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of analysts have recently weighed in on the company. Cantor Fitzgerald restated an “overweight” rating and issued a $502.00 target price on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Thursday, June 4th. Truist Financial decreased their price objective on shares of Microsoft from $675.00 to $575.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, April 30th. New Street Research lowered their price objective on shares of Microsoft from $675.00 to $600.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. Citigroup assumed coverage on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Monday, June 1st. They issued a “market outperform” rating for the company. Finally, Oppenheimer reiterated an “outperform” rating and set a $515.00 target price (down from $630.00) on shares of Microsoft in a research report on Monday, April 27th. Forty-one equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and six have given a Hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $560.86.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CEO Judson Althoff sold 15,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, June 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $460.99, for a total value of $7,145,345.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 110,477 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $50,928,792.23. This represents a 12.30% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, EVP Takeshi Numoto sold 4,500 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, June 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $402.84, for a total transaction of $1,812,780.00. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president owned 47,468 shares in the company, valued at $19,122,009.12. This represents a 8.66% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 23,762 shares of company stock worth $10,508,361. Insiders own 0.03% of the company’s stock.

Microsoft Price Performance

MSFT opened at $352.83 on Friday. The company has a fifty day moving average price of $411.13 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $421.81. The firm has a market capitalization of $2.62 trillion, a PE ratio of 21.00, a P/E/G ratio of 1.32 and a beta of 1.11. Microsoft Corporation has a 52 week low of $349.20 and a 52 week high of $555.45. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.08, a quick ratio of 1.27 and a current ratio of 1.28.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, April 29th. The software giant reported $4.27 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $4.06 by $0.21. Microsoft had a return on equity of 31.94% and a net margin of 39.34%.The company had revenue of $82.89 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $81.44 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $3.46 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 18.3% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, analysts anticipate that Microsoft Corporation will post 16.76 earnings per share for the current year.

Microsoft Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, September 10th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, August 20th will be paid a $0.91 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, August 20th. This represents a $3.64 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.0%. Microsoft’s dividend payout ratio is presently 21.67%.

Microsoft Profile

Microsoft Corporation is a global technology company headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975 by Bill Gates and Paul Allen, Microsoft develops, licenses and supports a broad range of software products, services and devices for consumers, enterprises and governments worldwide. Its operations span personal computing, productivity software, cloud infrastructure, enterprise applications, developer tools and gaming.

Microsoft’s product portfolio includes the Windows operating system and the Microsoft 365 suite of productivity and collaboration tools (Office apps, Outlook, Teams).