Citigroup Cuts Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) Price Target to $635.00

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) had its price target cut by Citigroup from $660.00 to $635.00 in a research report sent to investors on Thursday morning, MarketBeat reports. They currently have a buy rating on the software giant’s stock.

A number of other analysts have also commented on the stock. Stifel Nicolaus decreased their price target on shares of Microsoft from $640.00 to $520.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, January 26th. KeyCorp reduced their target price on Microsoft from $630.00 to $600.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Thursday. Wall Street Zen lowered shares of Microsoft from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Sunday, January 18th. Robert W. Baird set a $540.00 price objective on Microsoft and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday. Finally, Raymond James Financial cut their target price on shares of Microsoft from $630.00 to $600.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, October 30th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty have issued a Buy rating and three have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $597.73.

Microsoft Trading Down 0.7%

Shares of MSFT stock opened at $430.29 on Thursday. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $475.83 and its 200 day simple moving average is $499.66. The company has a quick ratio of 1.39, a current ratio of 1.39 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.09. Microsoft has a twelve month low of $344.79 and a twelve month high of $555.45. The firm has a market capitalization of $3.20 trillion, a P/E ratio of 26.91, a P/E/G ratio of 1.74 and a beta of 1.07.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 28th. The software giant reported $4.14 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.86 by $0.28. The firm had revenue of $81.27 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $80.28 billion. Microsoft had a return on equity of 32.34% and a net margin of 39.04%.The business’s revenue was up 16.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $3.23 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that Microsoft will post 13.08 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Microsoft Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 12th. Investors of record on Thursday, February 19th will be paid a dividend of $0.91 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, February 19th. This represents a $3.64 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.8%. Microsoft’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 22.76%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, EVP Takeshi Numoto sold 2,850 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, December 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $478.72, for a total transaction of $1,364,352.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president owned 55,782 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $26,703,959.04. The trade was a 4.86% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CEO Judson Althoff sold 12,750 shares of the company’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 transaction of $6,266,880.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 129,349 shares in the company, valued at approximately $63,577,620.48. This trade represents a 8.97% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders have sold 54,100 shares of company stock worth $27,598,872 in the last ninety days. 0.03% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Microsoft

Institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Secured Retirement Advisors LLC raised its position in shares of Microsoft by 2.7% during the 4th quarter. Secured Retirement Advisors LLC now owns 14,487 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $7,006,000 after buying an additional 376 shares in the last quarter. Sigma Planning Corp increased its stake in Microsoft by 0.3% in the fourth quarter. Sigma Planning Corp now owns 135,011 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $65,425,000 after acquiring an additional 340 shares during the last quarter. Cullinan Associates Inc. raised its position in Microsoft by 0.4% during the fourth quarter. Cullinan Associates Inc. now owns 177,745 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $85,961,000 after purchasing an additional 680 shares in the last quarter. Belleair Asset Management LLC purchased a new stake in Microsoft during the fourth quarter valued at about $1,260,000. Finally, North Star Investment Management Corp. lifted its stake in Microsoft by 2.0% during the fourth quarter. North Star Investment Management Corp. now owns 95,719 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $46,292,000 after purchasing an additional 1,884 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 71.13% of the company’s stock.

Key Headlines Impacting Microsoft

Here are the key news stories impacting Microsoft this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Large commercial deals and partnerships underpin continued demand — Microsoft landed a major cloud customer agreement (Perplexity, reported as a $750M deal), which demonstrates Azure can win sizable AI workloads and supports future revenue. Perplexity signs $750 million AI cloud deal with Microsoft
• Positive Sentiment: Long-term AI opportunity remains large — analysts and commentators note that potential liquidity events (e.g., an OpenAI IPO) and continued hyperscaler AI demand could boost infrastructure spending that benefits Microsoft’s cloud and services over time. Could A $1 Trillion OpenAI IPO Save The Day For Nvidia, Microsoft?
• Positive Sentiment: Backlog/RPO growth signals demand — Microsoft’s commercial remaining performance obligations (backlog) jumped materially year-over-year, implying multi-year contracted revenue tied to AI workloads. Microsoft demand backlog doubles to $625 billion
• Neutral Sentiment: Quarterly results were solid but mixed — MSFT beat on revenue and EPS (Q2 results) yet the company issued guidance and commentary that implied a modest moderation in Azure growth vs. prior quarter; the market is parsing growth vs. the cost profile. Microsoft Q2 earnings beat on top and bottom lines
• Neutral Sentiment: Options and sentiment flows amplify moves — unusually high call-option buying and heavy volume have increased intraday volatility and may accentuate both selloffs and snapbacks. Stock Of The Day: Is This The Bottom For Microsoft?
• Negative Sentiment: Investor backlash to capex and margin risk — the core negative: investors punished MSFT because AI capex jumped (reported ~$37.5B in the quarter) while Azure growth showed signs of slowing, raising doubts about near-term returns. That drove a sharp selloff and a big market-cap contraction. Microsoft tumbled 10% in a day and isn’t recovering premarket. Here’s why
• Negative Sentiment: Analyst cuts & guidance uncertainty — several firms trimmed price targets or flagged near-term Azure/margin risks, increasing downside pressure even as many maintain buy ratings longer term. These Analysts Slash Their Forecasts On Microsoft Following Q2 Results
• Negative Sentiment: Legal/investor scrutiny follows the shock drop — law firms have opened investigations and class-action notices have surfaced, which can keep sentiment fragile near-term. Microsoft Corporation Investigated on Behalf of Investors

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).