Wedbush Reiterates Outperform Rating for Salesforce (NYSE:CRM)

Key Points

• Wedbush reiterated an Outperform rating on Salesforce and set a $325 price target, implying about 82.7% upside from the prior close.
• Salesforce’s latest earnings beat expectations, reporting $3.88 EPS on $11.13 billion in revenue, with revenue up 13.3% year over year. The company also raised its FY2027 EPS guidance.
• Despite the positive results, shares were softer because the near-term revenue outlook slightly missed Wall Street estimates. Analyst sentiment remains broadly constructive, with multiple firms keeping bullish ratings and a consensus Moderate Buy view.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM - Get Free Report)'s stock had its "outperform" rating reiterated by equities researchers at Wedbush in a report released on Thursday,Benzinga reports. They currently have a $325.00 target price on the CRM provider's stock. Wedbush's price target suggests a potential upside of 82.72% from the stock's previous close.

A number of other analysts have also recently commented on the stock. Wall Street Zen cut shares of Salesforce from a "buy" rating to a "hold" rating in a research report on Saturday, April 18th. Stifel Nicolaus cut their target price on Salesforce from $300.00 to $250.00 and set a "buy" rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, February 26th. KeyCorp reiterated an "overweight" rating on shares of Salesforce in a report on Thursday. Piper Sandler restated an "overweight" rating and set a $215.00 price target on shares of Salesforce in a report on Thursday. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered their price objective on shares of Salesforce from $365.00 to $320.00 and set an "overweight" rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, February 26th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-six have assigned a Buy rating, eight have given a Hold rating and three have issued a Sell rating to the company's stock. According to MarketBeat, Salesforce has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $271.21.

Salesforce Stock Down 0.7%

NYSE:CRM opened at $177.86 on Thursday. The firm's 50 day simple moving average is $181.23 and its 200 day simple moving average is $211.16. Salesforce has a one year low of $163.52 and a one year high of $278.81. The company has a market cap of $145.53 billion, a PE ratio of 22.77, a P/E/G ratio of 1.25 and a beta of 1.14. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.18, a current ratio of 0.76 and a quick ratio of 0.76.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, May 27th. The CRM provider reported $3.88 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $3.13 by $0.75. Salesforce had a return on equity of 15.38% and a net margin of 17.96%.The company had revenue of $11.13 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $11.05 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $2.58 earnings per share. The firm's quarterly revenue was up 13.3% on a year-over-year basis. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 14.060-14.120 EPS and its Q2 2027 guidance at 3.250-3.270 EPS. On average, research analysts anticipate that Salesforce will post 9.71 earnings per share for the current year.

Salesforce announced that its board has initiated a stock repurchase plan on Monday, March 16th that allows the company to repurchase $25.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization allows the CRM provider to reacquire up to 14.1% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are often an indication that the company's management believes its stock is undervalued.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Salesforce news, Director David Blair Kirk acquired 2,570 shares of the company's stock in a transaction on Wednesday, March 18th. The shares were purchased at an average cost of $194.62 per share, with a total value of $500,173.40. Following the completion of the purchase, the director owned 13,689 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $2,664,153.18. This represents a 23.11% increase in their ownership of the stock. The acquisition was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, Director Laura Alber acquired 2,571 shares of Salesforce stock in a transaction dated Thursday, March 19th. The shares were acquired at an average price of $194.58 per share, with a total value of $500,265.18. Following the completion of the acquisition, the director directly owned 9,530 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $1,854,347.40. The trade was a 36.94% increase in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this purchase are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders own 3.50% of the company's stock.

Institutional Trading of Salesforce

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of CRM. Commonwealth Retirement Investments LLC purchased a new position in Salesforce during the 4th quarter worth $25,000. Board of the Pension Protection Fund purchased a new position in Salesforce during the fourth quarter worth about $26,000. Key Capital Management INC bought a new position in shares of Salesforce during the 4th quarter worth approximately $26,000. Gilpin Wealth Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of Salesforce in the 4th quarter worth approximately $26,000. Finally, Legacy Bridge LLC bought a new position in shares of Salesforce in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $27,000. 80.43% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Key Headlines Impacting Salesforce

Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Piper Sandler reaffirmed its Overweight rating on Salesforce and set a $215 price target, implying meaningful upside from current levels. Benzinga
• Positive Sentiment: Salesforce announced an expanded collaboration with CVS Health to use Agentforce Health AI agents to improve call center service for millions of members and providers, highlighting new enterprise use cases for its AI platform. PR Newswire
• Positive Sentiment: In Q1, Salesforce reported $3.88 EPS and $11.13 billion in revenue, both above expectations, with revenue up 13% year over year and margins improving. Reuters
• Positive Sentiment: The company also lifted its FY2027 EPS guidance, signaling management still expects strong profitability even as investors question AI disruption risk. MarketBeat
• Neutral Sentiment: Analysts and media coverage remain focused on the key debate: whether Salesforce can maintain growth and monetize AI quickly enough to offset broader disruption concerns in enterprise software. CNBC
• Negative Sentiment: Despite the earnings beat, Salesforce’s near-term revenue outlook slightly missed Wall Street estimates, which is the main reason shares have been softer. Stocktwits

Salesforce Company Profile

Salesforce, founded in 1999 and headquartered in San Francisco, is a global provider of cloud-based software focused on customer relationship management (CRM) and enterprise applications. The company popularized the software-as-a-service (SaaS) model for CRM and has built a broad portfolio of products designed to help organizations manage sales, service, marketing, commerce and analytics through a unified, cloud-first platform.

Core offerings include Sales Cloud for sales automation, Service Cloud for customer support, Marketing Cloud for digital marketing and engagement, and Commerce Cloud for e-commerce.

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