Salesforce Inc. $CRM Stock: Letko Brosseau & Associates Inc. Grows Stake

Key Points

• Letko Brosseau & Associates increased its Salesforce stake by 11.9% in the third quarter, adding 60,045 shares to hold 564,855 shares valued at about $129.7 million.
• Institutional investors own 80.43% of Salesforce shares. Analysts’ consensus rating is “Moderate Buy,” with an average price target of $278.98.
• Salesforce reported quarterly EPS of $5.90, beating the $3.27 consensus estimate; revenue rose 10.8% year over year to $11.35 billion.

Letko Brosseau & Associates Inc. lifted its stake in Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM - Free Report) by 11.9% in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 564,855 shares of the CRM provider's stock after acquiring an additional 60,045 shares during the period. Salesforce accounts for approximately 1.7% of Letko Brosseau & Associates Inc.'s holdings, making the stock its 21st biggest position. Letko Brosseau & Associates Inc. owned approximately 0.07% of Salesforce worth $129,674,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in CRM. BlackRock Inc. bought a new stake in Salesforce during the second quarter worth approximately $11,396,844,000. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership lifted its position in Salesforce by 130.2% in the first quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 12,659,217 shares of the CRM provider's stock worth $2,363,096,000 after purchasing an additional 7,160,302 shares during the period. Bank of America Corp DE acquired a new stake in Salesforce in the second quarter worth approximately $1,914,086,000. Legal & General Group Plc acquired a new stake in Salesforce in the second quarter worth approximately $927,332,000. Finally, Bank of New York Mellon Corp bought a new position in Salesforce during the 2nd quarter valued at $844,928,000. 80.43% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages have recently issued reports on CRM. Wall Street Zen cut Salesforce from a "buy" rating to a "hold" rating in a research report on Saturday, August 1st. Argus upped their price objective on Salesforce from $290.00 to $300.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a report on Monday, August 31st. Guggenheim upped their price objective on Salesforce from $270.00 to $300.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a report on Thursday, September 17th. Canaccord Genuity Group raised their target price on Salesforce from $270.00 to $300.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research note on Thursday, September 17th. Finally, Erste Group Bank raised Salesforce from a "hold" rating to a "buy" rating in a report on Wednesday, August 5th. Four investment 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 assigned a Sell rating to the company's stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Salesforce currently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average target price of $278.98.

Salesforce Trading Down 0.3%

Shares of NYSE:CRM opened at $217.38 on Friday. 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 stock has a market capitalization of $178.91 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.82, a PEG ratio of 0.99 and a beta of 1.24. Salesforce Inc. has a 1-year low of $146.32 and a 1-year high of $269.11. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $236.19 and a 200 day moving average price of $198.42.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, August 26th. The CRM provider reported $5.90 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating 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 for the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $11.33 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $2.91 earnings per share. The firm's revenue 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. On average, research analysts anticipate that Salesforce Inc. will post 12.82 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Salesforce Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, October 8th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, September 17th were given a dividend of $0.44 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, September 17th. This represents a $1.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.8%. Salesforce's payout ratio is 16.04%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, Director Craig Conway sold 4,500 shares of the company's stock in a transaction on 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 sale, the director directly owned 5,437 shares of the company's stock, valued at $1,416,936.57. This represents a 45.29% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, Director David Blair Kirk purchased 4,176 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, September 18th. The stock was bought at an average price of $239.33 per share, with a total value of $999,442.08. Following the transaction, the director directly owned 18,748 shares in the company, valued at $4,486,958.84. This trade represents a 28.66% increase in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this purchase is available in the SEC filing. 3.50% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Salesforce Company 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.

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