NewEdge Advisors LLC Grows Position in Salesforce Inc. $CRM

Key Points

• NewEdge Advisors increased its Salesforce position by 6.6% in the second quarter, bringing its holdings to 90,082 shares valued at approximately $14.1 million. Institutional investors collectively own 80.43% of Salesforce stock.
• Salesforce reported quarterly EPS of $5.90, well above the $3.27 consensus estimate, while revenue rose 10.8% year over year to $11.35 billion. The company also declared a quarterly dividend of $0.44 per share, equivalent to a 0.7% annualized yield.
• Wall Street maintains a “Moderate Buy” consensus with an average price target of $267.12, although ratings range from Strong Buy to Sell. Salesforce’s AI expansion and acquisition strategy support the growth outlook, while competition, acquisition spending and elevated valuation remain risks.

NewEdge Advisors LLC lifted its position in shares of Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM - Free Report) by 6.6% during the second quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 90,082 shares of the CRM provider's stock after purchasing an additional 5,584 shares during the quarter. NewEdge Advisors LLC's holdings in Salesforce were worth $14,112,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. California State Teachers Retirement System grew its stake in Salesforce by 13,260.5% in the 2nd quarter. California State Teachers Retirement System now owns 188,085,056 shares of the CRM provider's stock valued at $29,465,405,000 after acquiring an additional 186,677,290 shares during the period. BlackRock Inc. acquired a new position in Salesforce during the second quarter worth $11,396,844,000. J. Stern & Co. LLP raised its position in Salesforce by 24,056.7% during the fourth 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 period. Bank of America Corp DE purchased a new position in Salesforce during the second quarter valued at $1,914,086,000. Finally, Norges Bank purchased a new position in Salesforce during the fourth quarter valued at $3,182,951,000. 80.43% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Salesforce Trading Up 1.8%

Shares of CRM opened at $247.41 on Friday. Salesforce Inc. has a 12-month low of $146.32 and a 12-month high of $269.11. The firm has a market capitalization of $203.62 billion, a P/E ratio of 22.55, a P/E/G ratio of 1.11 and a beta of 1.20. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $200.54 and a 200 day moving average price of $187.17. The company has a current ratio of 0.84, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.02.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM - Get Free Report) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, August 26th. The CRM provider reported $5.90 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.27 by $2.63. Salesforce had a return on equity of 24.90% and a net margin of 21.99%.The company had revenue of $11.35 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $11.33 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $2.91 earnings per share. The firm's quarterly revenue was up 10.8% compared to the same quarter last year. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 16.670-16.710 EPS and its Q3 2027 guidance at 3.420-3.440 EPS. Sell-side analysts forecast that Salesforce Inc. will post 12.83 EPS for the current year.

Salesforce Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, October 8th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, September 17th will be paid a $0.44 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, September 17th. This represents a $1.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.7%. Salesforce's payout ratio is presently 16.04%.

Insider Activity

In related news, Director Craig Conway sold 4,500 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction dated Friday, September 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $260.61, for a total transaction of $1,172,745.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director directly owned 5,437 shares in the company, valued at $1,416,936.57. This trade represents a 45.29% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Corporate insiders own 3.50% of the company's stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research analysts recently weighed in on the stock. Cantor Fitzgerald raised their price target on shares of Salesforce from $250.00 to $300.00 and gave the company an "overweight" rating in a research note on Wednesday, September 2nd. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft reiterated a "buy" rating on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Thursday, August 27th. Wedbush assumed coverage on Salesforce in a report on Wednesday, July 1st. They set an "outperform" rating for the company. Citigroup raised their target price on Salesforce from $204.00 to $233.00 and gave the company a "neutral" rating in a research report on Thursday, August 27th. Finally, Scotiabank lowered Salesforce from a "sector outperform" rating to a "sector perform" rating in a research note on Thursday, June 18th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-eight have given a Buy rating, fourteen have given a Hold rating and three have given a Sell rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $267.12.

Key Stories Impacting Salesforce

Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:

• Positive Sentiment: AI acquisition strategy is accelerating. Salesforce completed its acquisition of Fin, formerly Intercom, adding an AI customer-agent platform, a technical AI team and more than 30,000 customers. The company is also reportedly in talks to acquire voice-AI market-research startup Listen Labs for approximately $2 billion, potentially strengthening its customer-data and AI capabilities. Salesforce Completes Acquisition of Fin Salesforce Eyes $2 Billion Acquisition of Listen Labs
• Positive Sentiment: Salesforce is expanding its enterprise AI ecosystem. Its new Enterprise AI Harness is designed to coordinate multiple models and agents using shared business context, while the Claudeforce partnership with Anthropic combines Claude with Salesforce CRM. These initiatives support the company’s argument that Agentforce and related products can drive future growth. Salesforce’s Enterprise AI Harness Salesforce and Anthropic Announce Claudeforce
• Positive Sentiment: Recent fundamentals remain supportive. Salesforce’s latest quarter beat EPS estimates by a wide margin, revenue increased 10.8% year over year, and profitability improved. This strong report helped reverse the market’s earlier concern that AI would undermine Salesforce’s core business.
• Neutral Sentiment: Investor attention is unusually high. Zacks identifies CRM as a trending stock, while analysts and investors weigh its earnings momentum, Agentforce growth and upcoming Dreamforce commentary. Some coverage frames the recent rally as a reason to take profits rather than add exposure. Salesforce Is a Trending Stock
• Negative Sentiment: Competitive and technical risks remain. Microsoft is marketing an AI-powered migration tool to win Salesforce customers for Dynamics 365, while AI-native startup Lightfield raised $47 million to develop a potential Salesforce alternative. Technical analysts also warn that CRM may be running into chart resistance after its sharp advance, and some investors question whether rising debt and acquisition spending increase risk.

Salesforce Company Profile

Salesforce, Inc is a cloud-based software company that provides customer relationship management (CRM) technology and related enterprise applications. Its platform helps organizations manage sales, customer service, marketing, commerce, data analytics and business operations through subscription-based software and cloud services.

The company's product portfolio includes Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Marketing Cloud, Commerce Cloud, Data Cloud and the Salesforce Platform. Salesforce also offers Slack for workplace collaboration, Tableau for data visualization and analytics, MuleSoft for application integration, and artificial intelligence capabilities, including its Agentforce platform for building and deploying AI agents.

Founded in 1999, Salesforce is headquartered in San Francisco, California, and serves businesses and organizations across a broad range of industries and geographic markets worldwide.

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