Greenleaf Trust Sells 23,162 Shares of Microsoft Corporation $MSFT

Greenleaf Trust trimmed its position in Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) by 7.3% in the third quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 292,811 shares of the software giant’s stock after selling 23,162 shares during the quarter. Microsoft comprises approximately 1.4% of Greenleaf Trust’s holdings, making the stock its 5th largest position. Greenleaf Trust’s holdings in Microsoft were worth $151,661,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also bought and sold shares of the company. Longfellow Investment Management Co. LLC grew its holdings in Microsoft by 51.3% in the 2nd quarter. Longfellow Investment Management Co. LLC now owns 59 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $29,000 after buying an additional 20 shares during the last quarter. Westend Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 386.7% during the second quarter. Westend Capital Management LLC now owns 73 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $36,000 after buying an additional 58 shares during the last quarter. LSV Asset Management bought a new stake in shares of Microsoft in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $44,000. University of Illinois Foundation acquired a new stake in shares of Microsoft in the second quarter worth $50,000. Finally, ROSS JOHNSON & Associates LLC increased its position in Microsoft by 155.7% during the first quarter. ROSS JOHNSON & Associates LLC now owns 156 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $59,000 after acquiring an additional 95 shares during the period. 71.13% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Trending Headlines about Microsoft

Here are the key news stories impacting Microsoft this week:

• Positive Sentiment: New AI and robotics announcements — Microsoft unveiled robotics/agentic AI initiatives and pushed further into agentic AI for retail and frontline use, boosting enthusiasm that its product roadmap will translate into revenue from AI workloads. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Defense cloud contract — Microsoft won a sizable Air Force Cloud One task order (~$170M) that validates Azure’s position in government/defense spending and provides a tangible near‑term revenue win. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Investor reassessment of valuation — After recent weakness MSFT is seeing a rebound as analysts and market commentators highlight Microsoft’s relative growth, profitability and balance‑sheet strength versus software peers. That sentiment helped the stock move back up today. Read More.
• Neutral Sentiment: Analyst reaffirmations and mixed targets — Several firms (Jefferies, Guggenheim, UBS) kept Buy ratings even as many groups trimmed price targets; that leaves a mix of support and pressure in the tape heading into earnings. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Multiple price‑target cuts and downgrades — A wave of target trims (Cantor Fitzgerald, Wells Fargo adjustments, Rothschild/Redburn cuts and other downgrades) is adding selling pressure and keeps expectations muted into the Jan. 28 earnings print. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Service outages and security/privacy headlines — Recent widespread Microsoft 365/Outlook outages disrupted customers and raised reliability concerns; separate reports about providing BitLocker recovery keys to the FBI introduce potential reputational/privacy scrutiny. Read More.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several analysts have issued reports on MSFT shares. BNP Paribas Exane raised their price target on shares of Microsoft from $630.00 to $632.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Monday, November 3rd. Sanford C. Bernstein increased their target price on shares of Microsoft from $637.00 to $645.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 30th. UBS Group lowered their price target on Microsoft from $650.00 to $600.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday. Morgan Stanley raised their price objective on Microsoft from $625.00 to $650.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 30th. Finally, Piper Sandler restated an “overweight” rating and set a $650.00 price objective on shares of Microsoft in a research report on Thursday, October 30th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-five have issued a Buy rating and three have given a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Buy” and a consensus price target of $618.18.

Microsoft Trading Up 3.3%

Shares of MSFT opened at $465.95 on Friday. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $478.69 and a 200-day simple moving average of $501.18. The company has a current ratio of 1.40, a quick ratio of 1.39 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.10. The stock has a market cap of $3.46 trillion, a PE ratio of 33.14, a PEG ratio of 1.82 and a beta of 1.07. Microsoft Corporation has a 1 year low of $344.79 and a 1 year high of $555.45.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, October 29th. The software giant reported $4.13 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.65 by $0.48. Microsoft had a return on equity of 32.45% and a net margin of 35.71%.The firm had revenue of $77.67 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $75.49 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $3.30 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 18.4% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, sell-side analysts predict that Microsoft Corporation will post 13.08 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Microsoft Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 12th. Investors of record on Thursday, February 19th will be issued a dividend of $0.91 per share. This represents a $3.64 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.8%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, February 19th. Microsoft’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 25.89%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Microsoft

In other news, CEO Judson Althoff sold 12,750 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, December 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $491.52, for a total value of $6,266,880.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 129,349 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $63,577,620.48. The trade was a 8.97% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, insider Bradford L. Smith sold 38,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, November 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $518.64, for a total value of $19,967,640.00. Following the sale, the insider directly owned 461,597 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $239,402,668.08. This represents a 7.70% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders have sold a total of 54,100 shares of company stock worth $27,598,872 over the last ninety days. Corporate insiders own 0.03% of the company’s stock.

Microsoft Profile

Microsoft Corporation is a global technology company headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975 by Bill Gates and Paul Allen, Microsoft develops, licenses and supports a broad range of software products, services and devices for consumers, enterprises and governments worldwide. Its operations span personal computing, productivity software, cloud infrastructure, enterprise applications, developer tools and gaming.

Microsoft’s product portfolio includes the Windows operating system and the Microsoft 365 suite of productivity and collaboration tools (Office apps, Outlook, Teams).