Q1 Earnings Forecast for Salesforce Issued By KeyCorp

Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) – Research analysts at KeyCorp issued their Q1 2028 earnings estimates for Salesforce in a research note issued to investors on Wednesday, July 8th. KeyCorp analyst J. Ader forecasts that the CRM provider will earn $2.28 per share for the quarter. KeyCorp currently has a “Sector Weight” rating on the stock. The consensus estimate for Salesforce’s current full-year earnings is $10.29 per share. KeyCorp also issued estimates for Salesforce’s Q2 2028 earnings at $2.42 EPS, Q3 2028 earnings at $2.39 EPS and Q4 2028 earnings at $2.72 EPS.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, May 27th. The CRM provider reported $3.88 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.13 by $0.75. The business had revenue of $11.13 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $11.05 billion. Salesforce had a net margin of 18.73% and a return on equity of 18.72%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 13.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the business posted $2.58 earnings per share. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 14.060-14.120 EPS and its Q2 2027 guidance at 3.250-3.270 EPS.

A number of other analysts have also commented on CRM. Barclays upgraded Salesforce from an “overweight” rating to an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, June 18th. Bank of America started coverage on Salesforce in a research report on Monday, May 18th. They issued an “underperform” rating and a $160.00 target price on the stock. Phillip Securities cut Salesforce from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and cut their target price for the company from $253.00 to $166.00 in a research note on Monday, June 29th. B. Riley Financial upped their price target on Salesforce from $205.00 to $240.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, May 28th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company decreased their price target on shares of Salesforce from $210.00 to $200.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, May 28th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-seven have assigned a Buy rating, fourteen have given a Hold rating and three have given a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $254.42.

Salesforce Price Performance

Shares of NYSE CRM opened at $163.34 on Monday. The company has a fifty day moving average price of $171.89 and a 200 day moving average price of $194.02. The firm has a market cap of $133.77 billion, a PE ratio of 18.90, a PEG ratio of 0.88 and a beta of 1.18. The company has a current ratio of 0.79, a quick ratio of 0.79 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.15. Salesforce has a 1-year low of $146.32 and a 1-year high of $274.00.

Salesforce Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, July 2nd. Investors of record on Thursday, June 11th were issued a dividend of $0.44 per share. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, June 11th. This represents a $1.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.1%. Salesforce’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 20.37%.

Salesforce declared that its Board of Directors has approved a share buyback plan on Monday, March 16th that authorizes the company to repurchase $25.00 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the CRM provider to reacquire up to 14.1% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock repurchase plans are often an indication that the company’s board believes its shares are undervalued.

Institutional Trading of Salesforce

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Temasek Holdings Private Ltd increased its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 3.7% in the fourth quarter. Temasek Holdings Private Ltd now owns 683,790 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $181,143,000 after purchasing an additional 24,332 shares during the last quarter. SFE Investment Counsel lifted its stake in shares of Salesforce by 82.7% during the 4th quarter. SFE Investment Counsel now owns 17,394 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $4,608,000 after buying an additional 7,871 shares during the last quarter. Secured Retirement Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Salesforce during the 1st quarter worth about $1,004,000. Eminence Capital LP boosted its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 5.6% during the 3rd quarter. Eminence Capital LP now owns 830,536 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $196,837,000 after buying an additional 43,888 shares during the period. Finally, Hilton Head Capital Partners LLC bought a new stake in shares of Salesforce during the 4th quarter worth about $997,000. Institutional investors own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Salesforce News Roundup

Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Salesforce announced a $1 billion investment in Switzerland over five years to expand adoption of agentic AI, reinforcing its commitment to AI-led growth and potentially strengthening its international enterprise relationships.
• Positive Sentiment: A bullish deep-dive argued Salesforce is trading at a depressed valuation, with strong free-cash-flow generation and a large debt-funded buyback that reduced share count by more than 10%, signaling management confidence in the business.
• Neutral Sentiment: Salesforce also unveiled MCP-powered capabilities for Slackbot, which could improve product usefulness and customer engagement, but the market may need proof that these features translate into faster growth.
• Neutral Sentiment: Triveni Power Transmission’s partnership with Salesforce for customer engagement in manufacturing adds another example of industry adoption, though the near-term financial impact appears limited.
• Negative Sentiment: KeyBanc’s downgrade and slightly lower earnings forecast added to investor skepticism that Agentforce will become a major growth catalyst soon.
• Negative Sentiment: Several market commentaries highlighted that CRM has been a weak performer over the past year, and the recent pullback suggests investors remain cautious despite its lower valuation.

Salesforce Company 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.