Cantor Fitzgerald Cuts Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) Price Target to $590.00

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) had its target price trimmed by Cantor Fitzgerald from $639.00 to $590.00 in a research note issued to investors on Thursday morning,MarketScreener reports.

A number of other research firms also recently commented on MSFT. UBS Group reduced their price objective on shares of Microsoft from $650.00 to $600.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Friday. Jefferies Financial Group reaffirmed a “buy” rating on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Thursday. Arete Research upped their price target on Microsoft from $710.00 to $730.00 in a research report on Monday, October 27th. Weiss Ratings restated a “buy (b)” rating on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Wednesday, October 8th. Finally, Melius Research increased their price target on shares of Microsoft from $595.00 to $625.00 in a research note on Thursday, September 25th. Three investment 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 stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Buy” and an average target price of $618.18.

Microsoft Price Performance

NASDAQ MSFT opened at $465.95 on Thursday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.10, a quick ratio of 1.39 and a current ratio of 1.40. The stock has a 50-day simple moving average of $478.69 and a 200 day simple moving average of $501.21. The stock has a market capitalization of $3.46 trillion, a PE ratio of 33.14, a P/E/G ratio of 1.88 and a beta of 1.07. Microsoft has a twelve month low of $344.79 and a twelve month high of $555.45.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, October 29th. The software giant reported $4.13 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.65 by $0.48. Microsoft had a net margin of 35.71% and a return on equity of 32.45%. The company had revenue of $77.67 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $75.49 billion. During the same period last year, the business posted $3.30 EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 18.4% on a year-over-year basis. Research analysts anticipate that Microsoft will post 13.08 EPS for the current year.

Microsoft Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 12th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, February 19th will be paid a $0.91 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, February 19th. This represents a $3.64 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.8%. Microsoft’s dividend payout ratio is 25.89%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Microsoft

In other Microsoft news, EVP Takeshi Numoto sold 2,850 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, December 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $478.72, for a total value of $1,364,352.00. Following the sale, the executive vice president directly owned 55,782 shares in the company, valued at approximately $26,703,959.04. This trade represents a 4.86% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CEO Judson Althoff sold 12,750 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, December 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $491.52, for a total transaction of $6,266,880.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 129,349 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $63,577,620.48. This trade represents a 8.97% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 54,100 shares of company stock valued at $27,598,872. Corporate insiders own 0.03% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Microsoft

Institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the business. WFA Asset Management Corp lifted its stake in Microsoft by 27.0% in the 1st quarter. WFA Asset Management Corp now owns 1,016 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $427,000 after acquiring an additional 216 shares in the last quarter. Ironwood Wealth Management LLC. boosted its stake in shares of Microsoft by 0.3% during the 2nd quarter. Ironwood Wealth Management LLC. now owns 12,658 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $5,658,000 after buying an additional 38 shares during the last quarter. Discipline Wealth Solutions LLC grew its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 410.4% in the 3rd quarter. Discipline Wealth Solutions LLC now owns 2,659 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $1,144,000 after acquiring an additional 2,138 shares in the last quarter. Wealth Group Ltd. increased its position in shares of Microsoft by 1.2% in the fourth quarter. Wealth Group Ltd. now owns 2,374 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $1,000,000 after acquiring an additional 28 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Eagle Capital Management LLC increased its position in shares of Microsoft by 0.4% during the 4th quarter. Eagle Capital Management LLC now owns 23,097 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $9,735,000 after purchasing an additional 96 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 71.13% of the company’s stock.

More Microsoft News

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.

About Microsoft

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).