Raymond James Financial Forecasts Strong Price Appreciation for Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) Stock

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) had its price objective hoisted by Raymond James Financial from $490.00 to $570.00 in a research note published on Monday morning,Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has an outperform rating on the software giant’s stock.

Several other research firms have also recently issued reports on MSFT. Stifel Nicolaus boosted their target price on shares of Microsoft from $475.00 to $500.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, May 1st. KeyCorp reiterated a “sector weight” rating on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Thursday, April 17th. Loop Capital boosted their target price on shares of Microsoft from $550.00 to $600.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, July 24th. DA Davidson boosted their target price on shares of Microsoft from $500.00 to $600.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 2nd. Finally, Wedbush reiterated an “outperform” rating and issued a $600.00 target price on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Friday, July 25th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twenty-nine have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $555.86.

Microsoft Stock Up 0.1%

MSFT stock opened at $513.24 on Monday. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $486.89 and its 200-day simple moving average is $433.33. The company has a market capitalization of $3.81 trillion, a P/E ratio of 39.66, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.33 and a beta of 1.04. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.12, a current ratio of 1.37 and a quick ratio of 1.36. Microsoft has a 12 month low of $344.79 and a 12 month high of $518.29.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, July 30th. The software giant reported $3.65 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.35 by $0.30. The business had revenue of $76.44 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $73.79 billion. Microsoft had a net margin of 35.79% and a return on equity of 32.74%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 18.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $2.95 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Microsoft will post 13.08 earnings per share for the current year.

Microsoft Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, September 11th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, August 21st will be given a $0.83 dividend. This represents a $3.32 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.65%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, August 21st. Microsoft’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 25.66%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, EVP Judson Althoff sold 16,000 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, May 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $458.18, for a total value of $7,330,880.00. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president directly owned 98,010 shares in the company, valued at $44,906,221.80. This represents a 14.03% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, EVP Amy Coleman sold 13,243 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Thursday, May 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $452.01, for a total transaction of $5,985,968.43. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president owned 43,100 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $19,481,631. This trade represents a 23.50% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders sold 135,743 shares of company stock valued at $60,224,683. Corporate insiders own 0.03% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Microsoft

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the company. PMV Capital Advisers LLC increased its position in Microsoft by 5.9% during the second quarter. PMV Capital Advisers LLC now owns 359 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $178,000 after purchasing an additional 20 shares during the last quarter. Seek First Inc. increased its position in Microsoft by 1.5% during the second quarter. Seek First Inc. now owns 1,358 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $675,000 after purchasing an additional 20 shares during the last quarter. Level Financial Advisors increased its position in Microsoft by 0.8% during the second quarter. Level Financial Advisors now owns 2,680 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $1,333,000 after purchasing an additional 20 shares during the last quarter. Red Mountain Financial LLC increased its position in Microsoft by 0.7% during the second quarter. Red Mountain Financial LLC now owns 2,761 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $1,373,000 after purchasing an additional 20 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Onyx Financial Advisors LLC increased its position in Microsoft by 0.3% during the second quarter. Onyx Financial Advisors LLC now owns 7,108 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $3,536,000 after purchasing an additional 20 shares during the last quarter. 71.13% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

About Microsoft

Microsoft Corporation develops and supports software, services, devices and solutions worldwide. The Productivity and Business Processes segment offers office, exchange, SharePoint, Microsoft Teams, office 365 Security and Compliance, Microsoft viva, and Microsoft 365 copilot; and office consumer services, such as Microsoft 365 consumer subscriptions, Office licensed on-premises, and other office services.