Ashton Thomas Securities LLC Cuts Stock Holdings in Oracle Corporation $ORCL

Key Points

• Ashton Thomas Securities cut its Oracle position by 45.6% in the first quarter, selling 12,493 shares and retaining 14,900 shares valued at approximately $2.19 million. By contrast, several major institutional investors, including Vanguard and State Street, increased their holdings.
• Oracle Vice Chairman Jeffrey Henley sold 400,000 shares for approximately $63.7 million under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan, reducing his direct position by 50%.
• Oracle reported better-than-expected quarterly results, with revenue up 20.6% year over year, while analysts maintain a broadly bullish outlook and a consensus “Moderate Buy” rating. Investors remain focused on the company’s AI backlog and cloud growth, alongside concerns about high leverage, rising financing costs and potential margin pressure.

Ashton Thomas Securities LLC decreased its position in Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL - Free Report) by 45.6% in the 1st quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 14,900 shares of the enterprise software provider's stock after selling 12,493 shares during the quarter. Ashton Thomas Securities LLC's holdings in Oracle were worth $2,190,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in ORCL. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in Oracle by 3.5% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 174,802,084 shares of the enterprise software provider's stock worth $34,070,674,000 after purchasing an additional 5,841,584 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp increased its stake in Oracle by 4.4% in the 4th quarter. State Street Corp now owns 76,527,759 shares of the enterprise software provider's stock valued at $14,916,026,000 after buying an additional 3,216,915 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its stake in Oracle by 1.8% in the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 37,734,944 shares of the enterprise software provider's stock valued at $7,328,754,000 after buying an additional 665,374 shares during the last quarter. Capital Research Global Investors lifted its position in shares of Oracle by 29.3% during the 4th quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 30,137,126 shares of the enterprise software provider's stock worth $5,874,070,000 after buying an additional 6,826,299 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Morgan Stanley lifted its position in shares of Oracle by 1.9% during the 4th quarter. Morgan Stanley now owns 27,125,099 shares of the enterprise software provider's stock worth $5,286,953,000 after buying an additional 495,146 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 42.44% of the company's stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, Vice Chairman Jeffrey Henley sold 400,000 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, June 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $159.16, for a total value of $63,664,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider directly owned 400,000 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $63,664,000. This trade represents a 50.00% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Company insiders own 40.90% of the company's stock.

Oracle News Roundup

Here are the key news stories impacting Oracle this week:

• Positive Sentiment: DA Davidson analyst Gil Luria argues that the market is assigning essentially no value to Oracle’s reported $630 billion AI backlog. Growing confidence in OpenAI’s long-term computing commitments could eventually improve investor perceptions of Oracle’s cloud infrastructure opportunity. Wall Street Is Valuing Oracle's $630B AI Backlog at Zero
• Positive Sentiment: Several analysts and opinion pieces see significant long-term upside, citing Oracle’s record cloud growth, AI contracts and a roughly $7 billion Pentagon agreement. However, these bullish views have not yet overcome concerns about valuation and execution. A $7 Billion Reason to Buy Oracle Stock Now
• Neutral Sentiment: Founder Larry Ellison has personally guaranteed approximately $40.4 billion of equity financing for Paramount Skydance’s proposed Warner Bros. Discovery transaction. The guarantee is personal rather than an Oracle obligation, but his 40.6% ownership makes the deal relevant to shareholders because of potential concentration and governance concerns. Larry Ellison and the Media Deal
• Negative Sentiment: Oracle’s credit-default-swap costs have risen to about 200 basis points, substantially above those of several other AI-linked issuers. Investors are increasingly worried that heavy borrowing for data centers could compress margins, raise financing costs and delay returns on AI spending. Oracle Stock and Default Insurance
• Negative Sentiment: Technology companies have issued roughly $194 billion of bonds for AI investment in 2026 through early July. Weaker demand and rising yields are fueling an industry-wide “AI debt fatigue” trade, with Oracle viewed as especially exposed because of its substantial infrastructure commitments and leverage.
• Negative Sentiment: Bearish commentary highlights the possibility of further selling if AI capital spending slows, OpenAI-related credit concerns worsen or Oracle’s expected margin compression becomes more pronounced. One investment firm also trimmed its Oracle position after strong cloud gains, reinforcing the near-term risk-off sentiment.

Oracle Stock Performance

Shares of ORCL opened at $117.77 on Thursday. Oracle Corporation has a 1 year low of $114.50 and a 1 year high of $345.72. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.21, a current ratio of 1.12 and a quick ratio of 1.12. The stock's fifty day moving average price is $166.35 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $165.16. The firm has a market cap of $339.23 billion, a PE ratio of 20.20, a PEG ratio of 0.75 and a beta of 1.72.

Oracle (NYSE:ORCL - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, June 10th. The enterprise software provider reported $2.11 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.96 by $0.15. The company had revenue of $19.18 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $19.10 billion. Oracle had a return on equity of 58.62% and a net margin of 25.37%.The firm's revenue for the quarter was up 20.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $1.70 EPS. Oracle has set its Q1 2027 guidance at 1.720-1.760 EPS and its FY 2027 guidance at 8.050-8.050 EPS. On average, equities research analysts forecast that Oracle Corporation will post 6.47 EPS for the current year.

Oracle Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, July 24th. Investors of record on Friday, July 10th were paid a dividend of $0.50 per share. This represents a $2.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.7%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, July 10th. Oracle's dividend payout ratio is presently 34.31%.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts have recently issued reports on the company. TD Cowen upped their target price on Oracle from $250.00 to $300.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a report on Monday, June 8th. DA Davidson lifted their price target on Oracle from $200.00 to $225.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a report on Thursday, June 11th. Arete Research set a $255.00 price objective on Oracle and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a research report on Thursday, May 7th. Oppenheimer upped their price objective on Oracle from $235.00 to $275.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research note on Monday, June 8th. Finally, Citigroup reaffirmed a "market outperform" rating on shares of Oracle in a research report on Thursday, June 11th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-eight have assigned a Buy rating, eight have assigned a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $265.03.

About Oracle

Oracle Corporation is a multinational technology company that develops and sells database software, cloud engineered systems, enterprise software applications and related services. The company is widely known for its flagship Oracle Database and a portfolio of enterprise-grade software products that support data management, application development, analytics and middleware. Over recent years Oracle has expanded its focus to include cloud infrastructure and cloud applications, positioning itself as a provider of both platform and software-as-a-service solutions for large organizations.

Oracle's product and service offerings include Oracle Database and the Autonomous Database, Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI), enterprise resource planning (ERP), human capital management (HCM) and supply chain management (SCM) cloud applications (often grouped under Oracle Fusion Cloud Applications), middleware such as WebLogic, and developer technologies including Java and MySQL.

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