Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) Shares Up 4% – Time to Buy?

Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) shot up 4% during mid-day trading on Wednesday . The stock traded as high as $190.18 and last traded at $188.6870. 16,739,957 shares were traded during mid-day trading, an increase of 21% from the average daily volume of 13,886,396 shares. The stock had previously closed at $181.50.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts recently weighed in on the stock. Barclays upgraded Salesforce from an “overweight” rating to an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, June 18th. Phillip Securities lowered Salesforce from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and decreased their price objective for the stock from $253.00 to $166.00 in a report on Monday, June 29th. TD Cowen restated a “buy” rating on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Friday, June 12th. Wells Fargo & Company reduced their target price on Salesforce from $210.00 to $200.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, May 28th. Finally, BTIG Research reiterated a “buy” rating and set a $255.00 price target on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Tuesday, May 26th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-four have assigned a Buy rating, sixteen have assigned a Hold rating and four have assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $249.51.

Salesforce Price Performance

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.15, a quick ratio of 0.79 and a current ratio of 0.79. The firm has a market cap of $150.26 billion, a P/E ratio of 21.25, a P/E/G ratio of 1.02 and a beta of 1.18. The company has a 50-day moving average of $170.26 and a 200 day moving average of $185.02.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, May 27th. The CRM provider reported $3.88 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.13 by $0.75. The firm had revenue of $11.13 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $11.05 billion. Salesforce had a return on equity of 18.72% and a net margin of 18.73%.The business’s revenue was up 13.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $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. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Salesforce Inc. will post 10.29 EPS 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 paid a dividend of $0.44 per share. This represents a $1.76 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.0%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, June 11th. Salesforce’s dividend payout ratio is currently 20.37%.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the company. Commonwealth Retirement Investments LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Salesforce in the fourth quarter valued at $25,000. Key Capital Management INC acquired a new stake in Salesforce in the 4th quarter valued at about $26,000. Gilpin Wealth Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Salesforce in the fourth quarter worth about $26,000. Legacy Bridge LLC bought a new position in shares of Salesforce in the fourth quarter worth about $27,000. Finally, Birchwood Financial Partners Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Salesforce during the fourth quarter worth approximately $28,000. Institutional investors own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

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.