Chesley Taft & Associates LLC Buys 41,847 Shares of Salesforce Inc. $CRM

Chesley Taft & Associates LLC lifted its stake in Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) by 96.6% during the second quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund owned 85,183 shares of the CRM provider’s stock after buying an additional 41,847 shares during the period. Chesley Taft & Associates LLC’s holdings in Salesforce were worth $13,345,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of CRM. Commonwealth Retirement Investments LLC bought a new stake in Salesforce during the fourth quarter worth $25,000. Key Capital Management INC acquired a new stake in Salesforce in the fourth quarter valued at $26,000. Gilpin Wealth Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Salesforce in the 4th quarter valued at about $26,000. Legacy Bridge LLC bought a new position in shares of Salesforce in the 4th quarter valued at about $27,000. Finally, Swiss RE Ltd. acquired a new position in shares of Salesforce during the 4th quarter worth about $28,000. Institutional investors own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Salesforce Trading Up 3.1%

Shares of CRM stock opened at $192.48 on Friday. Salesforce Inc. has a 12-month low of $146.32 and a 12-month high of $269.11. The company has a market capitalization of $157.64 billion, a PE ratio of 22.28, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.01 and a beta of 1.16. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $171.23 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $183.26. The company has a quick ratio of 0.79, a current ratio of 0.79 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.15.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, May 27th. The CRM provider reported $3.88 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.13 by $0.75. The company had revenue of $11.13 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $11.05 billion. Salesforce had a return on equity of 18.72% and a net margin of 18.73%.The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 13.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business 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. As a group, analysts predict that Salesforce Inc. will post 10.27 earnings per share for the current year.

Salesforce Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, July 2nd. Shareholders of record on Thursday, June 11th were issued a $0.44 dividend. This represents a $1.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.9%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, June 11th. Salesforce’s dividend payout ratio is currently 20.37%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities research analysts recently issued reports on CRM shares. B. Riley Financial raised their target price on shares of Salesforce from $205.00 to $240.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, May 28th. Royal Bank Of Canada cut Salesforce from a “sector perform” rating to a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, July 1st. TD Cowen reiterated a “buy” rating on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Friday, June 12th. HSBC boosted their target price on Salesforce from $350.00 to $356.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, May 29th. Finally, Evercore restated an “outperform” rating on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Tuesday, July 14th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-five have given a Buy rating, sixteen have assigned a Hold rating and four have given a Sell rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $249.51.

Salesforce 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.