Independent Franchise Partners LLP Acquires New Stake in Salesforce Inc. $CRM

Independent Franchise Partners LLP acquired a new stake in shares of Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) in the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The institutional investor acquired 537,999 shares of the CRM provider’s stock, valued at approximately $142,521,000. Salesforce makes up approximately 0.9% of Independent Franchise Partners LLP’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 22nd largest holding.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its stake in Salesforce by 0.3% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 89,843,166 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $23,800,353,000 after purchasing an additional 270,913 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp boosted its stake in Salesforce by 1.3% during the 4th quarter. State Street Corp now owns 50,080,230 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $13,286,909,000 after purchasing an additional 659,573 shares during the last quarter. J. Stern & Co. LLP boosted its stake in 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 purchasing an additional 47,189,352 shares during the last quarter. Capital International Investors boosted its stake in Salesforce by 13.3% during the 4th quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 22,721,010 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $6,019,199,000 after purchasing an additional 2,669,891 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its stake in Salesforce by 3.8% during the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 21,782,556 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $5,751,073,000 after purchasing an additional 791,345 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Salesforce Trading Down 4.2%

Shares of CRM stock opened at $154.88 on Thursday. Salesforce Inc. has a 12-month low of $154.23 and a 12-month high of $276.80. The company has a current ratio of 0.79, a quick ratio of 0.79 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.15. The stock’s 50-day moving average price is $178.54 and its 200-day moving average price is $205.28. The stock has a market capitalization of $126.85 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 17.93, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.01 and a beta of 1.16.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, May 27th. The CRM provider reported $3.88 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.13 by $0.75. Salesforce had a return on equity of 18.72% and a net margin of 18.73%.The firm had revenue of $11.13 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $11.05 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $2.58 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 13.3% compared to the same quarter last year. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 14.060-14.120 EPS and its Q2 2027 guidance at 3.250-3.270 EPS. Equities research analysts predict that Salesforce Inc. will post 10.29 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Salesforce Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, July 2nd. Shareholders of record on Thursday, June 11th will be given a dividend of $0.44 per share. This represents a $1.76 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.1%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, June 11th. Salesforce’s payout ratio is 20.37%.

Salesforce declared that its Board of Directors has initiated a stock buyback plan on Monday, March 16th that allows the company to buyback $25.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization allows the CRM provider to reacquire up to 14.1% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are usually a sign that the company’s board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several analysts have commented on CRM shares. Morgan Stanley cut their target price on Salesforce from $398.00 to $287.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, February 23rd. BMO Capital Markets cut their target price on Salesforce from $225.00 to $215.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, May 28th. Citizens Jmp reiterated a “market outperform” rating and set a $315.00 target price on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Thursday, May 28th. Wall Street Zen upgraded Salesforce from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Saturday, June 6th. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada restated a “neutral” rating on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Thursday, June 4th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-six have issued a Buy rating, ten have issued a Hold rating and two have issued a Sell rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $259.26.

Key Salesforce News

Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Salesforce announced a $3.6 billion acquisition of Fin, a customer AI agent platform, reinforcing its push into agentic AI and potentially expanding its automation and customer-service capabilities. Salesforce to acquire customer AI agent platform Fin for $3.6B
• Positive Sentiment: Some analysts remain constructive, with reaffirmed Buy ratings and targets well above the current share price, suggesting potential upside if Salesforce’s AI strategy and cash generation continue to improve. Analyst rating updates
• Neutral Sentiment: UBS reiterated a Neutral rating, reflecting a wait-and-see stance as investors assess whether Salesforce can convert its AI investments into faster growth. UBS sticks neutral
• Neutral Sentiment: Reports highlighting strong cash flow, rising margins, and a large buyback plan support the view that Salesforce still has financial flexibility to reward shareholders while investing in growth. CRM’s Record Cash Generation Support Robust Shareholder Returns
• Negative Sentiment: Multiple articles raised concerns that Salesforce’s acquisition-heavy strategy may not be translating into sustained growth reacceleration, with some analysts cutting fair value estimates and questioning AI monetization. Salesforce (CRM) Stock Sees Fair Value Cut As Analysts Question AI Growth Path
• Negative Sentiment: Commentary also pointed to “unit economic” concerns and recent share-price weakness, suggesting investors are worried the market is still paying closer attention to execution risk than to the long-term AI opportunity. Salesforce: Putting The Spotlight On The Unit Economic Concerns

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.