Principal Financial Group Inc. Has $5.56 Billion Holdings in Microsoft Corporation $MSFT

Principal Financial Group Inc. raised its holdings in Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) by 1.1% in the first quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund owned 15,016,976 shares of the software giant’s stock after acquiring an additional 158,841 shares during the period. Microsoft comprises 3.0% of Principal Financial Group Inc.’s portfolio, making the stock its 2nd biggest holding. Principal Financial Group Inc.’s holdings in Microsoft were worth $5,558,840,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other large investors also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Longfellow Investment Management Co. LLC boosted its position in shares of Microsoft by 51.3% in the 2nd quarter. Longfellow Investment Management Co. LLC now owns 59 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $29,000 after purchasing an additional 20 shares during the period. Bernzott Capital Advisors acquired a new stake in shares of Microsoft during the fourth quarter worth approximately $34,000. Timmons Wealth Management LLC purchased a new position in Microsoft during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $36,000. Fairway Wealth LLC grew its position in Microsoft by 287.0% during the fourth quarter. Fairway Wealth LLC now owns 89 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $43,000 after purchasing an additional 66 shares in the last quarter. Finally, LSV Asset Management acquired a new position in Microsoft in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $44,000. Institutional investors own 71.13% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

MSFT has been the topic of a number of research reports. Truist Financial reaffirmed a “buy” rating and issued a $575.00 price target on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Wednesday, July 22nd. Evercore reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and set a $525.00 price target on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Wednesday, July 15th. Tigress Financial boosted their price target on Microsoft from $595.00 to $680.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, May 6th. Citizens Jmp restated a “market outperform” rating and issued a $550.00 price objective on shares of Microsoft in a report on Tuesday. Finally, Robert W. Baird cut their price objective on shares of Microsoft from $540.00 to $500.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, April 15th. Forty-two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and six have given a Hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $554.73.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, CEO Judson Althoff sold 15,500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, June 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $460.99, for a total transaction of $7,145,345.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 110,477 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $50,928,792.23. The trade was a 12.30% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, EVP Takeshi Numoto sold 4,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, June 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $402.84, for a total value of $1,812,780.00. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president directly owned 47,468 shares in the company, valued at $19,122,009.12. This trade represents a 8.66% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders sold a total of 23,762 shares of company stock valued at $10,508,361 in the last quarter. Insiders own 0.03% of the company’s stock.

Key Headlines Impacting Microsoft

Here are the key news stories impacting Microsoft this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Microsoft unveiled its first in-house cybersecurity AI model, MAI-Cyber-1-Flash, along with Project Perception, an agentic platform designed to detect and respond to AI-powered attacks. The products could strengthen Microsoft’s enterprise security position and create additional demand for Azure and security services. Microsoft launches AI cybersecurity model and defense platform
• Positive Sentiment: Analysts remained bullish ahead of earnings. Citizens JMP reaffirmed a Market Outperform rating with a $550 target, while Piper Sandler maintained an Overweight rating and a $540 target—well above Microsoft’s recent trading range. Microsoft stock moves higher
• Positive Sentiment: Microsoft’s expanding partnerships and integrations across Azure, Dynamics 365 and Microsoft 365 Copilot support the argument that its broad enterprise ecosystem can monetize AI spending over time. Morgan Stanley estimates major technology companies could achieve 25%–50% returns on AI investments. AI capital expenditure plans

Microsoft Stock Performance

MSFT opened at $393.35 on Wednesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.08, a quick ratio of 1.27 and a current ratio of 1.28. The company has a market cap of $2.92 trillion, a PE ratio of 23.41, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.19 and a beta of 1.13. The stock has a 50-day moving average of $397.04 and a 200-day moving average of $406.36. Microsoft Corporation has a 52-week low of $349.20 and a 52-week high of $555.45.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, April 29th. The software giant reported $4.27 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $4.06 by $0.21. Microsoft had a return on equity of 31.94% and a net margin of 39.34%.The firm had revenue of $82.89 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $81.44 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $3.46 EPS. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 18.3% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Microsoft Corporation will post 16.7 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Microsoft Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, September 10th. Investors of record on Thursday, August 20th will be paid a $0.91 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, August 20th. This represents a $3.64 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.9%. Microsoft’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 21.67%.

About Microsoft

Microsoft Corporation is a global technology company headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975 by Bill Gates and Paul Allen, Microsoft develops, licenses and supports a broad range of software products, services and devices for consumers, enterprises and governments worldwide. Its operations span personal computing, productivity software, cloud infrastructure, enterprise applications, developer tools and gaming.

Microsoft’s product portfolio includes the Windows operating system and the Microsoft 365 suite of productivity and collaboration tools (Office apps, Outlook, Teams).