Salesforce Inc. $CRM Shares Sold by HighTower Advisors LLC

HighTower Advisors LLC trimmed its holdings in Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) by 3.5% during the second quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 361,825 shares of the CRM provider’s stock after selling 13,306 shares during the quarter. HighTower Advisors LLC’s holdings in Salesforce were worth $56,683,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other large investors have also made changes to their positions in the company. California State Teachers Retirement System lifted its position in Salesforce by 13,260.5% during the second quarter. California State Teachers Retirement System now owns 188,085,056 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $29,465,405,000 after buying an additional 186,677,290 shares in the last quarter. BlackRock Inc. purchased a new stake in Salesforce in the 2nd quarter valued at $11,396,844,000. J. Stern & Co. LLP increased its stake in shares of Salesforce by 24,056.7% in the 4th quarter. J. Stern & Co. LLP now owns 47,385,511 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $12,552,896,000 after acquiring an additional 47,189,352 shares during the last quarter. Bank of America Corp DE purchased a new position in shares of Salesforce during the 2nd quarter worth $1,914,086,000. Finally, Norges Bank acquired a new position in shares of Salesforce during the 4th quarter valued at about $3,182,951,000. 80.43% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

CRM has been the subject of several recent analyst reports. Phillip Securities cut shares of Salesforce from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and cut their price objective for the stock from $253.00 to $166.00 in a research report on Monday, June 29th. Susquehanna initiated coverage on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Wednesday, July 1st. They issued a “neutral” rating for the company. Cantor Fitzgerald raised their price target on shares of Salesforce from $250.00 to $300.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, September 2nd. Oppenheimer reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and set a $275.00 price target (up from $250.00) on shares of Salesforce in a research report on Thursday, August 27th. Finally, TD Cowen upped their price objective on Salesforce from $240.00 to $280.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, August 27th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-seven have given a Buy rating, fifteen have assigned a Hold rating and three have assigned a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $266.50.

Insider Activity

In related news, Director Craig Conway sold 4,500 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, September 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $260.61, for a total transaction of $1,172,745.00. Following the transaction, the director owned 5,437 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,416,936.57. This represents a 45.29% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Corporate insiders own 3.50% of the company’s stock.

Salesforce Stock Performance

Shares of CRM stock opened at $259.39 on Tuesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.02, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a current ratio of 0.84. The firm has a market cap of $213.48 billion, a P/E ratio of 23.65, a P/E/G ratio of 1.20 and a beta of 1.20. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $193.90 and its 200-day moving average price is $185.49. Salesforce Inc. has a one year low of $146.32 and a one year high of $269.11.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, August 26th. The CRM provider reported $5.90 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.27 by $2.63. The firm had revenue of $11.35 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $11.33 billion. Salesforce had a net margin of 21.99% and a return on equity of 24.90%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 10.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $2.91 EPS. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 16.670-16.710 EPS and its Q3 2027 guidance at 3.420-3.440 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts predict that Salesforce Inc. will post 12.65 EPS for the current year.

Salesforce Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, October 8th. Investors of record on Thursday, September 17th will be issued a $0.44 dividend. This represents a $1.76 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.7%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, September 17th. Salesforce’s payout ratio is currently 16.04%.

Salesforce Company Profile

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.