Wedbush Increases Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) Price Target to $500.00

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) had its price target upped by stock analysts at Wedbush from $475.00 to $500.00 in a report issued on Tuesday, Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has an “outperform” rating on the software giant’s stock. Wedbush’s price objective would suggest a potential upside of 18.64% from the company’s previous close.

Several other equities analysts have also recently weighed in on MSFT. Tigress Financial raised their price objective on Microsoft from $433.00 to $475.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, November 29th. DA Davidson reaffirmed a “buy” rating and issued a $500.00 price objective on shares of Microsoft in a research report on Friday, March 15th. Jefferies Financial Group reiterated a “buy” rating and set a $465.00 price target on shares of Microsoft in a report on Wednesday, March 6th. Argus upped their price objective on Microsoft from $390.00 to $430.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, December 5th. Finally, China Renaissance started coverage on Microsoft in a research note on Tuesday, December 5th. They set a “buy” rating and a $466.00 target price on the stock. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirty-six have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, Microsoft has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $423.34.

Microsoft Stock Performance

NASDAQ MSFT opened at $421.43 on Tuesday. The company has a market cap of $3.13 trillion, a P/E ratio of 38.09, a PEG ratio of 2.25 and a beta of 0.89. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $409.64 and a 200 day simple moving average of $373.65. The company has a current ratio of 1.22, a quick ratio of 1.20 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.19. Microsoft has a 12-month low of $272.05 and a 12-month high of $430.82.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, January 30th. The software giant reported $2.93 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.76 by $0.17. The company had revenue of $62.02 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $61.14 billion. Microsoft had a net margin of 36.27% and a return on equity of 38.40%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 17.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $2.32 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts predict that Microsoft will post 11.63 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Microsoft news, insider Bradford L. Smith sold 45,000 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, February 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $411.78, for a total transaction of $18,530,100.00. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 574,129 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $236,414,839.62. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. In related news, insider Bradford L. Smith sold 3,303 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $406.12, for a total transaction of $1,341,414.36. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 570,826 shares in the company, valued at approximately $231,823,855.12. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, insider Bradford L. Smith sold 45,000 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, February 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $411.78, for a total value of $18,530,100.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 574,129 shares in the company, valued at $236,414,839.62. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 1,070,258 shares of company stock valued at $30,690,456 over the last quarter. 0.03% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in MSFT. Monumental Financial Group Inc. bought a new position in Microsoft during the 1st quarter valued at approximately $28,000. Friedenthal Financial bought a new position in shares of Microsoft during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $45,000. Bellevue Group AG purchased a new stake in Microsoft in the fourth quarter worth $46,000. Neo Ivy Capital Management bought a new stake in Microsoft in the fourth quarter valued at $58,000. Finally, Atlantic Private Wealth LLC increased its position in Microsoft by 534.5% during the 2nd quarter. Atlantic Private Wealth LLC now owns 184 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $63,000 after purchasing an additional 155 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 71.13% of the company’s stock.

Microsoft Company Profile

Microsoft Corporation develops and supports software, services, devices and solutions worldwide. The Productivity and Business Processes segment offers office, exchange, SharePoint, Microsoft Teams, office 365 Security and Compliance, Microsoft viva, and Microsoft 365 copilot; and office consumer services, such as Microsoft 365 consumer subscriptions, Office licensed on-premises, and other office services.