JPMorgan Chase & Co. Has Lowered Expectations for Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) Stock Price

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) had its target price cut by research analysts at JPMorgan Chase & Co. from $365.00 to $320.00 in a research report issued on Thursday,Benzinga reports. The brokerage presently has an “overweight” rating on the CRM provider’s stock. JPMorgan Chase & Co.‘s price target indicates a potential upside of 60.50% from the stock’s previous close.

CRM has been the topic of several other research reports. Robert W. Baird lowered their target price on shares of Salesforce from $325.00 to $315.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, December 4th. DA Davidson boosted their target price on Salesforce from $225.00 to $235.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, December 5th. Truist Financial set a $280.00 price target on Salesforce in a report on Thursday. Macquarie Infrastructure upped their price objective on Salesforce from $250.00 to $265.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, December 4th. Finally, Arete Research raised Salesforce to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Thursday, December 11th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-seven have assigned a Buy rating, twelve have assigned a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $283.49.

Salesforce Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE CRM traded up $7.63 during trading hours on Thursday, reaching $199.38. The stock had a trading volume of 26,268,993 shares, compared to its average volume of 12,516,195. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $226.45 and a 200-day moving average of $238.86. The firm has a market cap of $186.82 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.62, a PEG ratio of 1.26 and a beta of 1.27. The company has a current ratio of 0.98, a quick ratio of 0.98 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.14. Salesforce has a fifty-two week low of $174.57 and a fifty-two week high of $304.92.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 25th. The CRM provider reported $3.81 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.05 by $0.76. Salesforce had a return on equity of 14.41% and a net margin of 17.91%.The business had revenue of $11.20 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $11.18 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $2.78 earnings per share. The company’s revenue was up 12.1% compared to the same quarter last year. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 13.110-13.190 EPS and its Q1 2027 guidance at 3.110-3.130 EPS. Equities research analysts predict that Salesforce will post 7.46 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, Director David Blair Kirk acquired 1,936 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, December 17th. The shares were bought at an average price of $258.64 per share, for a total transaction of $500,727.04. Following the completion of the purchase, the director directly owned 10,677 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,761,499.28. This trade represents a 22.15% increase in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, Director Neelie Kroes sold 3,893 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, January 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $238.70, for a total transaction of $929,259.10. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 7,299 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,742,271.30. This trade represents a 34.78% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. 3.00% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Salesforce

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Anchor Investment Management LLC lifted its position in shares of Salesforce by 4.1% in the 4th quarter. Anchor Investment Management LLC now owns 4,837 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $1,281,000 after acquiring an additional 191 shares in the last quarter. TD Capital Management LLC raised its stake in Salesforce by 89.3% during the 4th quarter. TD Capital Management LLC now owns 212 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $56,000 after purchasing an additional 100 shares during the period. Tempo Wealth LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Salesforce in the fourth quarter valued at $1,134,000. Thryve Wealth Management LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Salesforce in the fourth quarter valued at $446,000. Finally, MidFirst Bank acquired a new stake in shares of Salesforce in the fourth quarter worth $6,495,000. Institutional investors own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Key Headlines Impacting Salesforce

Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Q4 beat and upbeat FY EPS outlook — Salesforce reported stronger-than-expected adjusted EPS ($3.81) and raised FY27 EPS guidance well above consensus, signaling margin leverage and profit durability. Salesforce Q4 earnings / press materials
• Positive Sentiment: Big capital returns — management authorized a $50 billion buyback and raised the quarterly dividend, boosting shareholder returns and supporting EPS per-share growth through repurchases. CNBC: Salesforce commits $50 billion for new buybacks
• Positive Sentiment: Early AI (Agentforce) commercial traction — management and coverage note that Agentforce and other AI offerings are beginning to convert into measurable revenue, helping justify the guidance and longer-term targets. MarketBeat: Salesforce’s AI Bet Is Paying Off—the Buyback Proves It
• Neutral Sentiment: Revenue growth is solid but not accelerating — Q4 revenue grew ~12% Y/Y; some outlets frame results as “good but not game-changing,” leaving upside tied to mid-year reacceleration. Zacks: Q4 Earnings Beat, Revenues Rise
• Neutral Sentiment: Mixed analyst reactions — while many firms maintain Buy/Outperform stances, a number of analysts trimmed price targets to reflect slower near-term growth; the consensus remains skewed positive but with lower near-term expectations. MarketBeat: Analysts’ reactions and price-target moves
• Negative Sentiment: Near-term growth slowdown flagged — Jefferies highlights that cRPO growth (~13% CC) only matched guidance and lacked the upside investors had seen previously, raising concern about mid-year reacceleration. Proactive: Salesforce faces near-term growth slowdown, Jefferies says
• Negative Sentiment: Multiple price-target cuts and at least one downgrade — several firms cut targets (examples include Sanford Bernstein’s underperform and multiple lower PTs reported by Benzinga/TickerReport), reflecting reduced near-term expectations and pressuring sentiment. TickerReport: Analyst moves and downgrades
• Negative Sentiment: Investor worry about AI-driven software disruption persists — despite Agentforce traction, headlines and analyst notes show continued concern that AI could compress long-term pricing/penetration for traditional SaaS, keeping volatility elevated. WSJ: AI threat to software concern

About Salesforce

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.