Penn Davis Mcfarland Inc. Buys Shares of 155,266 Salesforce Inc. $CRM

Penn Davis Mcfarland Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) during the first quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm purchased 155,266 shares of the CRM provider’s stock, valued at approximately $28,984,000. Salesforce makes up about 2.8% of Penn Davis Mcfarland Inc.’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 15th biggest holding.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Commonwealth Retirement Investments LLC acquired a new position in Salesforce in the fourth quarter valued at about $25,000. Board of the Pension Protection Fund acquired a new stake in shares of Salesforce during the fourth quarter worth about $26,000. Key Capital Management INC bought a new position in shares of Salesforce during the 4th quarter valued at about $26,000. Gilpin Wealth Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Salesforce during the 4th quarter valued at about $26,000. Finally, Legacy Bridge LLC acquired a new position in shares of Salesforce in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $27,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several analysts have commented on CRM shares. BMO Capital Markets dropped their target price on shares of Salesforce from $225.00 to $215.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, May 28th. HSBC upped their price target on shares of Salesforce from $350.00 to $356.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, May 29th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their price objective on shares of Salesforce from $365.00 to $320.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, February 26th. Stifel Nicolaus cut their price objective on shares of Salesforce from $300.00 to $250.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, February 26th. Finally, Truist Financial set a $280.00 target price on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Thursday, February 26th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-six have assigned a Buy rating, eleven have issued a Hold rating and four have issued a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $257.61.

Salesforce Trading Down 1.5%

NYSE CRM opened at $150.39 on Friday. Salesforce Inc. has a 52 week low of $146.32 and a 52 week high of $276.80. 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 stock’s 50 day moving average price is $175.95 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $201.50. The stock has a market capitalization of $123.17 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 17.41, a PEG ratio of 0.95 and a beta of 1.16.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, May 27th. The CRM provider reported $3.88 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.13 by $0.75. Salesforce had a net margin of 18.73% and a return on equity of 18.72%. The company had revenue of $11.13 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $11.05 billion. During the same period last year, the business earned $2.58 EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 13.3% on a year-over-year basis. 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 10.29 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Salesforce Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, July 2nd. Investors of record on Thursday, June 11th will be given a $0.44 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, June 11th. This represents a $1.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.2%. Salesforce’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 20.37%.

Salesforce declared that its board has approved a share buyback program on Monday, March 16th that allows the company to buyback $25.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization allows the CRM provider to repurchase up to 14.1% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are often an indication that the company’s board of directors believes its stock is undervalued.

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.