Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) Earns “Overweight” Rating from Cantor Fitzgerald

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM)‘s stock had its “overweight” rating reiterated by stock analysts at Cantor Fitzgerald in a research report issued to clients and investors on Thursday,Benzinga reports. They presently have a $250.00 target price on the CRM provider’s stock. Cantor Fitzgerald’s target price would suggest a potential upside of 40.20% from the company’s current price.

A number of other equities research analysts have also commented on the stock. Morgan Stanley dropped their price objective on shares of Salesforce from $398.00 to $287.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, February 23rd. Truist Financial set a $280.00 target price on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Thursday, February 26th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. reduced their price objective on shares of Salesforce from $365.00 to $320.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, February 26th. Oppenheimer reduced their target price on shares of Salesforce from $275.00 to $250.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, February 26th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group reiterated a “buy” rating on shares of Salesforce in a research report on Tuesday. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-seven have given a Buy rating, eight have given a Hold rating and three have given a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $266.76.

Salesforce Trading Up 0.5%

Shares of Salesforce stock traded up $0.80 during trading on Thursday, reaching $178.31. 7,799,003 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 12,873,628. The firm has a market capitalization of $145.90 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.99, a P/E/G ratio of 1.25 and a beta of 1.14. Salesforce has a twelve month low of $163.52 and a twelve month high of $276.80. The business has a 50-day moving average price of $181.23 and a 200-day moving average price of $211.16. The company has a quick ratio of 0.76, a current ratio of 0.76 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.18.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, May 27th. The CRM provider reported $3.88 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.13 by $0.75. Salesforce had a net margin of 17.96% and a return on equity of 15.38%. The business had revenue of $11.13 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $11.05 billion. During the same period last year, the company posted $2.58 EPS. Salesforce’s revenue for the quarter 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. Sell-side analysts anticipate that Salesforce will post 9.71 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Salesforce declared that its board 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 shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback plans are typically a sign that the company’s board believes its shares are undervalued.

Insider Buying and Selling at Salesforce

In related news, Director David Blair Kirk acquired 2,570 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, March 18th. The stock was acquired at an average cost of $194.62 per share, for a total transaction of $500,173.40. Following the completion of the acquisition, the director directly owned 13,689 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,664,153.18. This trade represents a 23.11% increase in their position. The acquisition was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, Director Laura Alber purchased 2,571 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, March 19th. The stock was bought at an average cost of $194.58 per share, with a total value of $500,265.18. Following the purchase, the director owned 9,530 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,854,347.40. This trade represents a 36.94% increase in their position. Additional details regarding this purchase are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders own 3.50% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Salesforce

Several institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in CRM. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 0.3% during the fourth 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 period. State Street Corp boosted its holdings in Salesforce by 1.3% during the 4th quarter. State Street Corp now owns 50,080,230 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $13,286,909,000 after acquiring an additional 659,573 shares during the last quarter. J. Stern & Co. LLP grew its position in 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 purchasing an additional 47,189,352 shares in the last quarter. Capital International Investors grew its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 13.3% in the fourth quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 22,721,010 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $6,019,199,000 after acquiring an additional 2,669,891 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC increased its holdings in Salesforce by 3.8% during the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 21,782,556 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $5,751,073,000 after buying an additional 791,345 shares during the last quarter. 80.43% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Salesforce News Roundup

Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Piper Sandler reaffirmed its Overweight rating on Salesforce and set a $215 price target, implying meaningful upside from current levels. Benzinga
• Positive Sentiment: Salesforce announced an expanded collaboration with CVS Health to use Agentforce Health AI agents to improve call center service for millions of members and providers, highlighting new enterprise use cases for its AI platform. PR Newswire
• Positive Sentiment: In Q1, Salesforce reported $3.88 EPS and $11.13 billion in revenue, both above expectations, with revenue up 13% year over year and margins improving. Reuters
• Positive Sentiment: The company also lifted its FY2027 EPS guidance, signaling management still expects strong profitability even as investors question AI disruption risk. MarketBeat
• Neutral Sentiment: Analysts and media coverage remain focused on the key debate: whether Salesforce can maintain growth and monetize AI quickly enough to offset broader disruption concerns in enterprise software. CNBC
• Negative Sentiment: Despite the earnings beat, Salesforce’s near-term revenue outlook slightly missed Wall Street estimates, which is the main reason shares have been softer. Stocktwits

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.