First Merchants Corp Reduces Stock Position in Salesforce Inc. $CRM

First Merchants Corp cut its holdings in Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) by 69.4% in the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 1,154 shares of the CRM provider’s stock after selling 2,615 shares during the period. First Merchants Corp’s holdings in Salesforce were worth $273,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also bought and sold shares of the company. Norges Bank purchased a new position in shares of Salesforce in the second quarter valued at $2,826,049,000. Laurel Wealth Advisors LLC boosted its stake in Salesforce by 27,361.5% in the 2nd quarter. Laurel Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 3,424,169 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $933,737,000 after purchasing an additional 3,411,700 shares during the period. Acadian Asset Management LLC grew its holdings in Salesforce by 1,729.6% during the 2nd quarter. Acadian Asset Management LLC now owns 1,973,141 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $538,020,000 after buying an additional 1,865,297 shares in the last quarter. Amundi increased its position in shares of Salesforce by 26.2% during the second quarter. Amundi now owns 7,755,317 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $2,087,545,000 after buying an additional 1,612,413 shares during the period. Finally, Schroder Investment Management Group lifted its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 45.8% in the second quarter. Schroder Investment Management Group now owns 3,931,945 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $1,072,202,000 after buying an additional 1,234,969 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

CRM has been the subject of several recent analyst reports. Truist Financial reduced their price objective on shares of Salesforce from $400.00 to $380.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, December 4th. Citigroup lowered shares of Salesforce from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, December 5th. Stifel Nicolaus decreased their price target on shares of Salesforce from $325.00 to $300.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, October 9th. Northland Securities lifted their price objective on Salesforce from $264.00 to $267.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 4th. Finally, BTIG Research initiated coverage on Salesforce in a research note on Tuesday, December 16th. They issued a “buy” rating and a $335.00 target price on the stock. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-nine have issued a Buy rating, thirteen have assigned a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $327.74.

Salesforce Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE CRM opened at $266.06 on Thursday. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $250.25 and its 200 day moving average is $251.64. The stock has a market cap of $249.30 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 35.52, a P/E/G ratio of 1.96 and a beta of 1.26. Salesforce Inc. has a 1-year low of $221.96 and a 1-year high of $367.09. The company has a current ratio of 0.98, a quick ratio of 0.98 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.14.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, December 3rd. The CRM provider reported $3.25 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.86 by $0.39. The business had revenue of $10.26 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $10.27 billion. Salesforce had a net margin of 17.91% and a return on equity of 14.41%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 9.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the business earned $2.41 earnings per share. Salesforce has set its Q4 2026 guidance at 3.020-3.040 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Salesforce Inc. will post 7.46 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Salesforce Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, January 8th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, December 18th will be paid a $0.416 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, December 18th. This represents a $1.66 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.6%. Salesforce’s payout ratio is currently 22.16%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Salesforce

In other news, insider Parker Harris sold 134,662 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, December 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $234.70, for a total transaction of $31,605,171.40. Following the transaction, the insider directly owned 139,767 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $32,803,314.90. This trade represents a 49.07% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, Director G Mason Morfit bought 96,000 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, December 5th. The stock was bought at an average cost of $260.58 per share, with a total value of $25,015,680.00. Following the purchase, the director owned 2,994,509 shares in the company, valued at $780,309,155.22. The trade was a 3.31% increase in their position. The SEC filing for this purchase provides additional information. In the last ninety days, insiders have sold 157,284 shares of company stock valued at $37,274,684. Corporate insiders own 3.00% of the company’s stock.

Salesforce 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.