Maridea Wealth Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM – Free Report) during the second quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor bought 2,911 shares of the CRM provider’s stock, valued at approximately $456,000.
A number of other large investors also recently modified their holdings of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its stake 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 valued at $23,800,353,000 after buying an additional 270,913 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp grew its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 1.3% during the fourth quarter. State Street Corp now owns 50,080,230 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $13,286,909,000 after buying an additional 659,573 shares during the last quarter. J. Stern & Co. LLP increased its position in shares of Salesforce by 24,056.7% during the fourth quarter. J. Stern & Co. LLP now owns 47,385,511 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $12,552,896,000 after acquiring an additional 47,189,352 shares in the last quarter. Capital International Investors increased its position in shares of Salesforce by 13.3% during the fourth quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 22,721,010 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $6,019,199,000 after acquiring an additional 2,669,891 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 3.8% in the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 21,782,556 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $5,751,073,000 after acquiring an additional 791,345 shares during the last quarter. 80.43% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.
Key Headlines Impacting Salesforce
Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:
- Positive Sentiment: JPMorgan resumed coverage with an Overweight rating and a $250 price target, citing potential acceleration in Salesforce’s core business during the second half of the year. The target implies more than 24% upside from recent levels. JPMorgan bullish Salesforce coverage
- Positive Sentiment: Monness Crespi & Hardt raised its Salesforce price target to $222 from $200 and maintained a Buy rating. UBS and Wells Fargo also reportedly forecast strong appreciation, reinforcing improving sell-side sentiment. Monness Crespi Salesforce price target
- Positive Sentiment: Salesforce’s Agentforce platform is gaining traction, giving the company a way to use its large CRM customer base to compete with Microsoft and Oracle in enterprise “agentic” AI. Salesforce agentic AI analysis
- Positive Sentiment: A Seeking Alpha analysis argues that Salesforce’s $27.1 billion share-repurchase program, equivalent to an estimated 23% net buyback yield, could support earnings-per-share growth. The stock also appears inexpensive at roughly 14 times forward earnings, although buybacks have increased debt. Salesforce buyback analysis
- Neutral Sentiment: Salesforce has recently posted strong momentum, with reports noting three consecutive weeks of gains and substantial one-month appreciation. That run may be encouraging investors, but it also raises the possibility of profit-taking.
- Negative Sentiment: Parnassus Investments indicated that Salesforce has lost favor as AI opportunities shift toward competing or substitute technologies. Other commentary likewise warns that alternative software and AI-native tools threaten Salesforce’s traditional CRM franchise. Salesforce AI competition concerns
Salesforce Stock Down 2.7%
Salesforce (NYSE:CRM – Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, May 27th. The CRM provider reported $3.88 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.13 by $0.75. Salesforce had a net margin of 18.73% and a return on equity of 18.72%. The firm had revenue of $11.13 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $11.05 billion. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $2.58 EPS. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 13.3% on a year-over-year basis. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 14.060-14.120 EPS and its Q2 2027 guidance at 3.250-3.270 EPS. Research analysts predict that Salesforce Inc. will post 10.27 EPS for the current fiscal year.
Salesforce Dividend Announcement
The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, July 2nd. Stockholders of record on Thursday, June 11th were issued a $0.44 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, June 11th. This represents a $1.76 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.9%. Salesforce’s dividend payout ratio is currently 20.37%.
Analysts Set New Price Targets
CRM has been the topic of several recent research reports. Barclays raised shares of Salesforce from an “overweight” rating to an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, June 18th. Weiss Ratings raised Salesforce from a “sell (d+)” rating to a “hold (c-)” rating in a report on Wednesday. Guggenheim raised Salesforce from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $228.00 price objective for the company in a research note on Wednesday, July 1st. Piper Sandler lowered Salesforce from an “overweight” rating to a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, May 28th. Finally, Daiwa Securities Group cut their target price on Salesforce from $295.00 to $280.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, June 2nd. Two analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-five have assigned a Buy rating, seventeen have given a Hold rating and three have assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $249.05.
Get Our Latest Research Report on Salesforce
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.
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