Pallas Capital Advisors LLC Grows Position in Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT)

Pallas Capital Advisors LLC grew its holdings in shares of Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT - Free Report) by 1.4% in the 1st quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 153,358 shares of the software giant's stock after acquiring an additional 2,087 shares during the quarter. Microsoft accounts for approximately 2.4% of Pallas Capital Advisors LLC's investment portfolio, making the stock its 4th largest position. Pallas Capital Advisors LLC's holdings in Microsoft were worth $57,569,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the business. WFA Asset Management Corp increased its position in Microsoft by 27.0% during the 1st quarter. WFA Asset Management Corp now owns 1,016 shares of the software giant's stock valued at $427,000 after purchasing an additional 216 shares during the period. Ironwood Wealth Management LLC. increased its position in Microsoft by 0.3% during the 2nd quarter. Ironwood Wealth Management LLC. now owns 12,658 shares of the software giant's stock valued at $5,658,000 after purchasing an additional 38 shares during the period. Discipline Wealth Solutions LLC increased its position in Microsoft by 410.4% during the 3rd quarter. Discipline Wealth Solutions LLC now owns 2,659 shares of the software giant's stock valued at $1,144,000 after purchasing an additional 2,138 shares during the period. Wealth Group Ltd. increased its position in Microsoft by 1.2% during the 4th quarter. Wealth Group Ltd. now owns 2,374 shares of the software giant's stock valued at $1,000,000 after purchasing an additional 28 shares during the period. Finally, Tallon Kerry Patrick acquired a new stake in Microsoft during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $1,375,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 71.13% of the company's stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research firms have weighed in on MSFT. Royal Bank Of Canada reissued an "outperform" rating and set a $525.00 target price on shares of Microsoft in a research report on Friday, May 23rd. Wells Fargo & Company increased their target price on shares of Microsoft from $565.00 to $585.00 and gave the company an "overweight" rating in a research report on Wednesday, June 25th. TD Securities increased their target price on shares of Microsoft from $475.00 to $490.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research report on Thursday, May 1st. Scotiabank increased their target price on shares of Microsoft from $470.00 to $500.00 and gave the company a "sector outperform" rating in a research report on Thursday, May 1st. Finally, BMO Capital Markets increased their price target on Microsoft from $485.00 to $550.00 and gave the stock an "outperform" rating in a report on Thursday. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twenty-nine have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average target price of $534.14.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, EVP Judson Althoff sold 16,000 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction on Monday, May 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $458.18, for a total transaction of $7,330,880.00. Following the sale, the executive vice president directly owned 98,010 shares in the company, valued at $44,906,221.80. The trade was a 14.03% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, insider Bradford L. Smith sold 6,000 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction on Monday, May 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $433.17, for a total value of $2,599,020.00. Following the sale, the insider owned 471,036 shares in the company, valued at $204,038,664.12. The trade was a 1.26% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 135,743 shares of company stock worth $60,224,683 in the last three months. 0.03% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Microsoft Stock Up 0.6%

Shares of MSFT traded up $3.24 during trading hours on Friday, reaching $504.72. The stock had a trading volume of 7,516,049 shares, compared to its average volume of 21,623,648. The company has a market capitalization of $3.75 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 39.00, a P/E/G ratio of 2.28 and a beta of 1.04. The firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $469.28 and a 200 day simple moving average of $425.41. Microsoft Corporation has a 12 month low of $344.79 and a 12 month high of $506.78. The company has a current ratio of 1.37, a quick ratio of 1.36 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.12.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, April 30th. The software giant reported $3.46 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $3.22 by $0.24. The business had revenue of $70.07 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $68.54 billion. Microsoft had a return on equity of 32.74% and a net margin of 35.79%. Microsoft's quarterly revenue was up 13.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $2.94 EPS. Equities research analysts predict that Microsoft Corporation will post 13.08 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Microsoft Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, September 11th. Investors of record on Thursday, August 21st will be given a $0.83 dividend. This represents a $3.32 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.66%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, August 21st. Microsoft's payout ratio is currently 25.66%.

About Microsoft

Microsoft Corporation develops and supports software, services, devices and solutions worldwide. The Productivity and Business Processes segment offers office, exchange, SharePoint, Microsoft Teams, office 365 Security and Compliance, Microsoft viva, and Microsoft 365 copilot; and office consumer services, such as Microsoft 365 consumer subscriptions, Office licensed on-premises, and other office services.