Salesforce Inc. $CRM Shares Newly Purchased by Providence First Trust Co

Key Points

• Providence First Trust acquired 4,640 Salesforce shares in the third quarter, a stake valued at approximately $1.065 million. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 80.43% of the company’s stock.
• Analysts’ consensus rating is “Moderate Buy,” with an average price target of $278.98; several brokerages recently raised their targets or issued buy ratings.
• Salesforce shares fell 3.8% to $213.96 in Friday trading. The company’s latest reported quarter beat earnings estimates and revenue rose 10.8% year over year.

Providence First Trust Co acquired a new stake in Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM - Free Report) during the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund acquired 4,640 shares of the CRM provider's stock, valued at approximately $1,065,000.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Fluent Financial LLC acquired a new position in Salesforce during the 2nd quarter worth about $2,265,000. TAM Capital Management Inc. acquired a new position in Salesforce in the 1st quarter valued at about $40,945,000. Janus Henderson Group PLC grew its position in Salesforce by 2.5% in the 1st quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 127,739 shares of the CRM provider's stock valued at $23,846,000 after acquiring an additional 3,125 shares in the last quarter. Anchor Investment Management LLC increased its stake in Salesforce by 184.5% during the second quarter. Anchor Investment Management LLC now owns 17,983 shares of the CRM provider's stock worth $2,817,000 after purchasing an additional 11,663 shares during the period. Finally, Next Capital Management LLC purchased a new stake in Salesforce during the first quarter worth about $2,119,000. 80.43% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several brokerages have recently issued reports on CRM. Mizuho increased their price target on shares of Salesforce from $265.00 to $280.00 and gave the stock an "outperform" rating in a research report on Wednesday, September 16th. TD Cowen assumed coverage on shares of Salesforce in a report on Monday, October 12th. They issued a "buy" rating for the company. Argus upped their target price on shares of Salesforce from $290.00 to $300.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a research note on Monday, August 31st. Stifel Nicolaus increased their target price on shares of Salesforce from $275.00 to $300.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a report on Thursday, September 17th. Finally, BMO Capital Markets increased their target price on shares of Salesforce from $250.00 to $285.00 and gave the stock an "outperform" rating in a report on Thursday, September 17th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-two have assigned a Buy rating, thirteen have assigned a Hold rating and three have issued a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average price target of $278.98.

Salesforce News Summary

Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Salesforce’s planned acquisition of AI voice-agent company Cresta could strengthen Agentforce and Service Cloud, adding capabilities for customer-service automation. The deal also brings acquisition costs and execution risks. Article: Salesforce Bets on AI Voice Agents With Planned Cresta Acquisition
• Positive Sentiment: Zacks Research upgraded Salesforce from “hold” to “strong buy,” a favorable analyst signal that may help counter near-term concerns. Article: Zacks Research rating
• Neutral Sentiment: Salesforce is expanding its Coworker offering and promoting a 21-times growth claim, but the report notes that no baseline is provided, making the figure difficult to assess. Article: Salesforce Expands Coworker’s Reach, but Its 21× Growth Claim Has No Baseline
• Neutral Sentiment: The company is extending Agent Fabric to help businesses manage AI agents across platforms. Its large customer base and reported 1.2 billion daily requests suggest potential, but investors still need evidence that the AI activity will translate into meaningful revenue. Article: Salesforce Stock: The 1 Number Investors Still Need to See
• Negative Sentiment: A broader software sell-off is weighing on CRM, while S&P Global Ratings cut Salesforce’s credit rating to A from A+. S&P cited acquisition spending and a $25 billion debt-financed buyback, which lifted pro forma net debt relative to EBITDA above its previous downgrade threshold. The rating action raises concerns about leverage and aggressive capital allocation. Article: S&P cuts Salesforce to A on rising acquisition debt and buybacks

Salesforce Stock Down 3.8%

CRM stock traded down $8.45 during mid-day trading on Friday, reaching $213.96. The company had a trading volume of 6,708,466 shares, compared to its average volume of 7,142,592. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.02, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a current ratio of 0.84. The company has a market capitalization of $176.09 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.50, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.03 and a beta of 1.24. The firm has a fifty day simple moving average of $239.53 and a 200 day simple moving average of $198.64. Salesforce Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $146.32 and a fifty-two week high of $269.11.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, August 26th. The CRM provider reported $5.90 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $3.27 by $2.63. Salesforce had a return on equity of 24.90% and a net margin of 21.99%. The business had revenue of $11.35 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $11.33 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $2.91 earnings per share. The business's revenue for the quarter was up 10.8% on a year-over-year basis. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 16.670-16.710 EPS and its Q3 2027 guidance at 3.420-3.440 EPS. Analysts forecast that Salesforce Inc. will post 12.82 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Salesforce Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, October 8th. Investors of record on Thursday, September 17th were paid a $0.44 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, September 17th. This represents a $1.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.8%. Salesforce's payout ratio is currently 16.04%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Salesforce news, Director Craig Conway sold 4,500 shares of the business's stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, September 4th. The shares were 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 owned 5,437 shares in the company, valued at $1,416,936.57. The trade was a 45.29% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, Director David Blair Kirk acquired 4,176 shares of the company's stock in a transaction on Friday, September 18th. The stock was purchased at an average cost of $239.33 per share, for a total transaction of $999,442.08. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 18,748 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,486,958.84. The trade was a 28.66% increase in their position. The SEC filing for this purchase provides additional information. 3.50% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Salesforce Profile

Salesforce, Inc is a cloud-based software company best known for customer relationship management (CRM) tools. Its platform helps businesses manage sales, customer service, marketing, commerce and customer data, and includes products such as Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Data Cloud and Agentforce.

The company also offers Slack for workplace collaboration, Tableau for data analytics and visualization, and MuleSoft for connecting applications and data. Salesforce's products are used by organizations across a range of industries and are available to customers around the world.

Founded in 1999 by Marc Benioff and other co-founders, Salesforce is headquartered in San Francisco.

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