Cullen Investment Group LTD. Sells 2,938 Shares of Salesforce Inc. $CRM

Cullen Investment Group LTD. reduced its stake in shares of Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) by 19.1% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 12,437 shares of the CRM provider’s stock after selling 2,938 shares during the quarter. Cullen Investment Group LTD.’s holdings in Salesforce were worth $3,233,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of CRM. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its holdings in Salesforce by 0.8% during the 3rd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 89,572,253 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $21,228,624,000 after buying an additional 748,772 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp boosted its position in Salesforce by 0.3% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 49,420,657 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $11,732,966,000 after buying an additional 159,739 shares during the last quarter. Capital International Investors increased its stake in shares of Salesforce by 9.4% in the 3rd quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 20,051,119 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $4,753,519,000 after buying an additional 1,729,440 shares during the period. Capital World Investors raised its position in shares of Salesforce by 159.0% during the third quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 17,325,206 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $4,106,255,000 after acquiring an additional 10,636,161 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Norges Bank bought a new stake in shares of Salesforce during the second quarter worth $2,826,049,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling at Salesforce

In other news, Director Laura Alber bought 2,571 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, March 19th. The shares were bought at an average cost of $194.58 per share, for a total transaction of $500,265.18. Following the completion of the acquisition, the director owned 9,530 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,854,347.40. This trade represents a 36.94% increase in their position. The acquisition was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, Director David Blair Kirk purchased 2,570 shares of Salesforce stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, March 18th. The shares were purchased at an average cost of $194.62 per share, for a total transaction of $500,173.40. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 13,689 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,664,153.18. This represents a 23.11% increase in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this purchase are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders own 3.00% of the company’s stock.

Key Stories Impacting Salesforce

Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:

• Positive Sentiment: A large customer rollout: Adecco is deploying Salesforce’s Agentforce 360 and Agentforce Voice across global recruiting operations, a commercial validation of Salesforce’s AI products that supports future ARR growth and upsell potential. Adecco’s Agentforce Rollout Puts Salesforce’s AI Story To The Test
• Positive Sentiment: Product expansion: Salesforce has integrated Agentforce for Small Business into its Suites, broadening the go-to-market footprint for its AI agent products and creating more cross-sell opportunities to smaller customers. Agentforce for Small Business is Now Built Into Salesforce Suites
• Positive Sentiment: Share-buyback support: Reports say Salesforce expanded buybacks after recent share weakness, a shareholder-friendly move that can support EPS and signal management confidence. These 3 Beaten-Down Stocks Just Announced Massive Share Buybacks
• Neutral Sentiment: Acquisition integration: Salesforce granted equity awards to Apromore hires under its inducement plan — routine for M&A hires and neutral for near-term cash flow but useful for integration. Salesforce Grants Equity Awards to Apromore Under Its Inducement Equity Incentive Plan
• Neutral Sentiment: Compensation changes: An internal memo says Salesforce will skip base raises for director-level and above but increase stock/bonus pools for top performers — a cost-managing move that prioritizes variable pay and may help margins but could affect morale. Salesforce isn’t giving raises to director-level and above employees this year, internal memo shows
• Negative Sentiment: AI competition fear: Shares fell after Anthropic unveiled Claude’s ability to control computers (imitate keystrokes/mouse), reviving investor concerns that more capable AI assistants could erode incumbent software moats. Why Salesforce (CRM) Shares Are Getting Obliterated Today
• Negative Sentiment: Revenue miss headlines: Coverage highlighted Salesforce’s first revenue shortfall in years, which amplified the selloff and raised near-term growth concerns despite previous quarterly beats and FY guidance. Salesforce (CRM) Tumbles 6% Following First Revenue Shortfall in Nearly Two Decades
• Negative Sentiment: Sector-wide AI jitters: Broader software selloff (including ServiceNow) on renewed AI disruption fears pressured CRM shares as investors reprice risk across enterprise software. Salesforce and Other Software Stocks Are Plummeting as AI Jitters Return

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities analysts recently issued reports on the company. Stifel Nicolaus decreased their price target on Salesforce from $300.00 to $250.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, February 26th. BMO Capital Markets dropped their price objective on Salesforce from $235.00 to $225.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, February 26th. Robert W. Baird reduced their target price on shares of Salesforce from $325.00 to $315.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, December 4th. Truist Financial set a $280.00 price target on shares of Salesforce in a research report on Thursday, February 26th. Finally, Morgan Stanley dropped their price target on shares of Salesforce from $398.00 to $287.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, February 23rd. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-six have issued a Buy rating, eleven have assigned a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $280.21.

Salesforce Trading Down 0.7%

NYSE:CRM opened at $181.69 on Thursday. The company has a current ratio of 0.76, a quick ratio of 0.76 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.18. Salesforce Inc. has a 1-year low of $174.57 and a 1-year high of $296.05. The firm has a market capitalization of $167.70 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 23.26, a PEG ratio of 1.33 and a beta of 1.29. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $200.32 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $231.70.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, February 25th. The CRM provider reported $3.81 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.05 by $0.76. The company had revenue of $11.20 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $11.18 billion. Salesforce had a return on equity of 15.38% and a net margin of 17.96%.The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 12.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $2.78 EPS. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 13.110-13.190 EPS and its Q1 2027 guidance at 3.110-3.130 EPS. On average, equities analysts expect that Salesforce Inc. will post 7.46 earnings per share for the current year.

Salesforce announced that its Board of Directors has initiated a stock repurchase program on Monday, March 16th that allows the company to repurchase $25.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization allows the CRM provider to purchase up to 14.1% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock repurchase programs are typically a sign that the company’s board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

Salesforce Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, April 23rd. Shareholders of record on Thursday, April 9th will be paid a $0.44 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 9th. This is a boost from Salesforce’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.42. This represents a $1.76 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.0%. Salesforce’s payout ratio is currently 21.25%.

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.