Portside Wealth Group LLC Increases Holdings in Salesforce Inc. $CRM

Portside Wealth Group LLC grew its holdings in shares of Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) by 89.5% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 12,397 shares of the CRM provider’s stock after buying an additional 5,855 shares during the quarter. Portside Wealth Group LLC’s holdings in Salesforce were worth $3,284,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in the business. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its holdings in Salesforce by 0.8% during the 3rd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 89,572,253 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $21,228,624,000 after buying an additional 748,772 shares during the period. State Street Corp raised its holdings in Salesforce by 0.3% during the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 49,420,657 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $11,732,966,000 after buying an additional 159,739 shares during the period. Capital International Investors raised its holdings in Salesforce by 9.4% during the 3rd quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 20,051,119 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $4,753,519,000 after buying an additional 1,729,440 shares during the period. Capital World Investors raised its holdings in Salesforce by 159.0% during the 3rd quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 17,325,206 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $4,106,255,000 after buying an additional 10,636,161 shares during the period. Finally, Invesco Ltd. raised its holdings in Salesforce by 11.8% during the 3rd quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 7,155,512 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $1,695,856,000 after buying an additional 754,116 shares during the period. 80.43% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

CRM has been the topic of several recent research reports. Royal Bank Of Canada decreased their price target on Salesforce from $290.00 to $210.00 and set a “sector perform” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, February 26th. Sanford C. Bernstein reduced their price objective on shares of Salesforce from $223.00 to $194.00 and set an “underperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, February 26th. Oppenheimer reduced their price objective on shares of Salesforce from $275.00 to $250.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, February 26th. Cantor Fitzgerald reissued an “overweight” rating on shares of Salesforce in a research report on Thursday, February 26th. Finally, Wolfe Research reissued an “outperform” rating on shares of Salesforce in a research report on Thursday, January 15th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-six have assigned a Buy rating, eleven have issued a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $280.21.

Salesforce Stock Performance

CRM stock opened at $185.12 on Tuesday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.76, a current ratio of 0.76 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.18. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $193.66 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $228.25. Salesforce Inc. has a twelve month low of $174.57 and a twelve month high of $296.05. The firm has a market cap of $170.86 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 23.70, a PEG ratio of 1.36 and a beta of 1.29.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, February 25th. The CRM provider reported $3.81 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.05 by $0.76. Salesforce had a return on equity of 15.38% and a net margin of 17.96%.The business had revenue of $11.20 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $11.18 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $2.78 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 12.1% compared to the same quarter last year. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 13.110-13.190 EPS and its Q1 2027 guidance at 3.110-3.130 EPS. Analysts predict that Salesforce Inc. will post 7.46 earnings per share for the current year.

Salesforce Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, April 23rd. Stockholders of record on Thursday, April 9th will be given a dividend of $0.44 per share. This represents a $1.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.0%. This is a boost from Salesforce’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.42. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 9th. Salesforce’s dividend payout ratio is 21.25%.

Salesforce declared that its Board of Directors has approved a stock repurchase plan on Monday, March 16th that permits the company to buyback $25.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization permits the CRM provider to reacquire up to 14.1% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are typically an indication that the company’s management believes its stock is undervalued.

Insider Transactions at Salesforce

In other news, Director Neelie Kroes sold 3,893 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, January 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $238.70, for a total transaction of $929,259.10. Following the transaction, the director directly owned 7,299 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,742,271.30. This trade represents a 34.78% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, Director David Blair Kirk bought 2,570 shares of Salesforce stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, March 18th. The shares were bought at an average cost of $194.62 per share, for a total transaction of $500,173.40. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 13,689 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,664,153.18. This trade represents a 23.11% increase in their position. Additional details regarding this purchase are available in the official SEC disclosure. Corporate insiders own 3.00% of the company’s stock.

Salesforce 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.