Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) Trading Up 4.7% – Still a Buy?

Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) was up 4.7% during trading on Monday . The stock traded as high as $173.40 and last traded at $172.7570. Approximately 12,350,013 shares were traded during mid-day trading, a decline of 5% from the average daily volume of 12,995,732 shares. The stock had previously closed at $164.96.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several analysts recently commented on CRM shares. Barclays reduced their price objective on shares of Salesforce from $265.00 to $252.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, February 26th. Oppenheimer reduced their price objective on shares of Salesforce from $275.00 to $250.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, February 26th. Mizuho reduced their price objective on shares of Salesforce from $280.00 to $265.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, February 26th. UBS Group reduced their price objective on shares of Salesforce from $260.00 to $200.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, February 17th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus reduced their price objective on shares of Salesforce from $300.00 to $250.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, February 26th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-six have issued a Buy rating, eleven have issued a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Salesforce presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $279.18.

Salesforce Price Performance

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.18, a quick ratio of 0.76 and a current ratio of 0.76. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $188.65 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $225.20. The stock has a market capitalization of $158.08 billion, a PE ratio of 21.93, a P/E/G ratio of 1.26 and a beta of 1.29.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last posted its earnings results 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 net margin of 17.96% and a return on equity of 15.38%. The firm had revenue of $11.20 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $11.18 billion. During the same period last year, the firm posted $2.78 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 12.1% on a year-over-year basis. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 13.110-13.190 EPS and its Q1 2027 guidance at 3.110-3.130 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that Salesforce Inc. will post 7.46 EPS for the current year.

Salesforce Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, April 23rd. Stockholders of record on Thursday, April 9th will be issued a dividend of $0.44 per share. This represents a $1.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.0%. This is a boost from Salesforce’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.42. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, April 9th. Salesforce’s payout ratio is presently 22.54%.

Salesforce announced that its Board of Directors has approved a share repurchase program on Monday, March 16th that permits the company to buyback $25.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization permits the CRM provider to purchase up to 14.1% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are typically an indication that the company’s board of directors believes its stock is undervalued.

Insider Transactions at Salesforce

In other news, Director Laura Alber purchased 2,571 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Thursday, March 19th. The stock was acquired at an average cost of $194.58 per share, for a total transaction of $500,265.18. Following the completion of the acquisition, the director directly owned 9,530 shares in the company, valued at $1,854,347.40. This represents a 36.94% increase in their position. The purchase was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, Director David Blair Kirk purchased 2,570 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, March 18th. The shares were purchased at an average price of $194.62 per share, with a total value of $500,173.40. Following the completion of the acquisition, the director owned 13,689 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,664,153.18. This represents a 23.11% increase in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this purchase are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders own 3.00% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Salesforce

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

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.