Trust Co. of Vermont Purchases New Shares in Salesforce Inc. $CRM

Trust Co. of Vermont purchased a new position in Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) during the 2nd quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor purchased 78,520 shares of the CRM provider’s stock, valued at approximately $12,301,000.

A number of other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in CRM. J. Stern & Co. LLP boosted its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 24,056.7% during the 4th quarter. J. Stern & Co. LLP now owns 47,385,511 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $12,552,896,000 after buying an additional 47,189,352 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank bought a new stake in Salesforce during the fourth quarter worth about $3,182,951,000. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership grew its holdings in Salesforce by 130.2% in the first quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 12,659,217 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $2,363,096,000 after purchasing an additional 7,160,302 shares during the period. Bank of New York Mellon Corp bought a new position in shares of Salesforce during the second quarter valued at approximately $844,928,000. Finally, Cardano Risk Management B.V. lifted its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 924.7% during the fourth quarter. Cardano Risk Management B.V. now owns 3,883,610 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $1,028,807,000 after purchasing an additional 3,504,605 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

CRM has been the topic of several recent research reports. CLSA assumed coverage on Salesforce in a research note on Monday, July 20th. They issued a “hold” rating and a $165.00 price target on the stock. Wolfe Research cut Salesforce from an “outperform” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 1st. Jefferies Financial Group raised Salesforce from a “buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, July 1st. B. Riley Financial increased their target price on Salesforce from $205.00 to $240.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, May 28th. Finally, Canaccord Genuity Group restated a “buy” rating and set a $225.00 price target on shares of Salesforce in a report on Tuesday, June 16th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-five have issued a Buy rating, seventeen have issued a Hold rating and three have given a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Salesforce has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $249.05.

Salesforce Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE CRM opened at $191.20 on Tuesday. The firm’s 50-day moving average price is $171.58 and its 200-day moving average price is $181.69. Salesforce Inc. has a 52-week low of $146.32 and a 52-week high of $269.11. The company has a market cap of $156.59 billion, a PE ratio of 22.13, a PEG ratio of 1.06 and a beta of 1.16. The company has a quick ratio of 0.79, a current ratio of 0.79 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.15.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, May 27th. The CRM provider reported $3.88 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.13 by $0.75. The firm had revenue of $11.13 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $11.05 billion. Salesforce had a net margin of 18.73% and a return on equity of 18.72%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 13.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $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. As a group, analysts anticipate that Salesforce Inc. will post 10.27 EPS for the current year.

Salesforce Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced 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. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, June 11th. This represents a $1.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.9%. Salesforce’s payout ratio is currently 20.37%.

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.