Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) Trading Down 1.7% – Here’s Why

Shares of Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) fell 1.7% during trading on Tuesday . The company traded as low as $160.50 and last traded at $161.7430. 15,568,676 shares changed hands during trading, an increase of 16% from the average daily volume of 13,448,682 shares. The stock had previously closed at $164.55.

More Salesforce News

Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Monness Crespi & Hardt upgraded Salesforce to buy and set a $200 price target, implying meaningful upside from current levels. Read More
• Positive Sentiment: Truist gave Salesforce a vote of confidence after the company announced its $3.6 billion acquisition of Fin, which should strengthen its AI/customer agent offerings and deepen its automation push. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Multiple articles highlight Salesforce as a long-term growth and generative AI play, with coverage pointing to Agentforce and broader AI monetization as potential drivers of future revenue growth. Article Title
• Neutral Sentiment: UBS reaffirmed its neutral rating, suggesting the market is still divided on Salesforce’s near-term setup despite the AI narrative. Read More
• Neutral Sentiment: A comparison piece versus Oracle highlights that Salesforce’s recent results and outlook are being judged against peers, with investors still parsing which cloud software name has the stronger earnings momentum. Article Title
• Negative Sentiment: Some recent commentary has focused on valuation cuts and questions about AI growth monetization, which may be weighing on sentiment and helping explain why the shares remain weak. Article Title

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research firms recently issued reports on CRM. Wall Street Zen upgraded Salesforce from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Saturday, June 6th. Monness Crespi & Hardt upgraded Salesforce from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $200.00 target price on the stock in a research report on Thursday. Barclays raised Salesforce from an “overweight” rating to an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday. Wedbush reiterated an “outperform” rating and set a $325.00 price target on shares of Salesforce in a research report on Thursday, May 28th. Finally, Canaccord Genuity Group reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $225.00 target price on shares of Salesforce in a report on Tuesday. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-six have assigned a Buy rating, twelve have assigned a Hold rating and three have assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, Salesforce presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $257.61.

Salesforce Price Performance

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.15, a current ratio of 0.79 and a quick ratio of 0.79. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $178.54 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $205.28. The company has a market cap of $124.22 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 17.55, 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 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates 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 for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $11.05 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $2.58 earnings per share. Salesforce’s quarterly 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. On average, equities research analysts predict that Salesforce Inc. will post 10.29 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Salesforce Announces Dividend

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

Salesforce announced that its Board of Directors has initiated a stock repurchase plan on Monday, March 16th that authorizes the company to repurchase $25.00 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the CRM provider to purchase up to 14.1% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock repurchase plans are often an indication that the company’s management believes its shares are undervalued.

Institutional Trading of Salesforce

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

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.