Aware Super Pty Ltd as trustee of Aware Super Purchases New Stake in Salesforce Inc. $CRM

Aware Super Pty Ltd as trustee of Aware Super acquired a new position in shares of Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) during the first quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm acquired 115,735 shares of the CRM provider’s stock, valued at approximately $21,604,000.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. J. Stern & Co. LLP increased its stake in shares of Salesforce by 24,056.7% in the 4th quarter. J. Stern & Co. LLP now owns 47,385,511 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $12,552,896,000 after acquiring an additional 47,189,352 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank acquired a new position in shares of Salesforce during the 4th quarter valued at about $3,182,951,000. Cardano Risk Management B.V. boosted its position in shares of Salesforce by 924.7% during the 4th quarter. Cardano Risk Management B.V. now owns 3,883,610 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $1,028,807,000 after acquiring an additional 3,504,605 shares during the last quarter. Capital International Investors grew its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 13.3% in the fourth quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 22,721,010 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $6,019,199,000 after purchasing an additional 2,669,891 shares during the period. Finally, Capital World Investors increased its position in Salesforce by 13.5% during the fourth quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 19,672,684 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $5,211,515,000 after purchasing an additional 2,347,478 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Salesforce Price Performance

Shares of CRM opened at $172.60 on Friday. The firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $170.85 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $191.34. The stock has a market cap of $141.36 billion, a PE ratio of 19.98, a P/E/G ratio of 0.90 and a beta of 1.18. Salesforce Inc. has a 1-year low of $146.32 and a 1-year high of $274.00. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.15, a current ratio of 0.79 and a quick ratio of 0.79.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, May 27th. The CRM provider reported $3.88 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.13 by $0.75. Salesforce had a net margin of 18.73% and a return on equity of 18.72%. The firm had revenue of $11.13 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $11.05 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $2.58 EPS. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 13.3% compared to the same quarter last year. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 14.060-14.120 EPS and its Q2 2027 guidance at 3.250-3.270 EPS. As a group, analysts forecast that Salesforce Inc. will post 10.29 EPS for the current year.

Salesforce Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, July 2nd. Stockholders of record on Thursday, June 11th were given a dividend of $0.44 per share. This represents a $1.76 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.0%. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, June 11th. Salesforce’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 20.37%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

CRM has been the topic of a number of analyst reports. Canaccord Genuity Group reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $225.00 target price on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Tuesday, June 16th. HC Wainwright cut shares of Salesforce to a “negative” rating in a research note on Thursday, June 18th. Wolfe Research downgraded shares of Salesforce from an “outperform” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Wednesday, July 1st. Wells Fargo & Company reduced their price target on shares of Salesforce from $210.00 to $200.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, May 28th. Finally, DA Davidson decreased their price objective on Salesforce from $200.00 to $175.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, May 28th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-seven have given a Buy rating, fourteen have issued a Hold rating and three have issued a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $254.42.

About Salesforce

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.