Raymond James Reaffirms “Outperform” Rating for Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT)

Raymond James reissued their outperform rating on shares of Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) in a research report released on Friday morning, Benzinga reports. The firm currently has a $480.00 target price on the software giant’s stock, up from their previous target price of $450.00.

MSFT has been the subject of several other reports. DA Davidson reissued a buy rating and set a $500.00 target price on shares of Microsoft in a research report on Friday, March 15th. StockNews.com downgraded shares of Microsoft from a buy rating to a hold rating in a research report on Thursday, February 22nd. Piper Sandler reaffirmed an overweight rating and issued a $465.00 price objective (up from $455.00) on shares of Microsoft in a research report on Friday. Evercore ISI upped their price objective on shares of Microsoft from $475.00 to $485.00 and gave the stock an outperform rating in a research report on Friday. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company upped their price objective on shares of Microsoft from $460.00 to $480.00 and gave the stock an overweight rating in a research report on Wednesday, April 17th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirty-two have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of Moderate Buy and an average target price of $452.61.

Microsoft Trading Up 1.8 %

NASDAQ:MSFT opened at $406.32 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a current ratio of 1.24 and a quick ratio of 1.23. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $414.48 and a 200-day moving average of $388.51. The company has a market cap of $3.02 trillion, a PE ratio of 35.18, a PEG ratio of 2.18 and a beta of 0.89. Microsoft has a one year low of $295.25 and a one year high of $430.82.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, April 25th. The software giant reported $2.94 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.81 by $0.13. The company had revenue of $61.86 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $60.86 billion. Microsoft had a net margin of 36.43% and a return on equity of 37.54%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 17.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $2.45 earnings per share. As a group, equities research analysts expect that Microsoft will post 11.71 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Microsoft Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, June 13th. Investors of record on Thursday, May 16th will be paid a dividend of $0.75 per share. This represents a $3.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.74%. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, May 15th. Microsoft’s payout ratio is currently 25.97%.

Insider Activity at Microsoft

In other Microsoft news, insider Bradford L. Smith sold 3,303 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $406.12, for a total value of $1,341,414.36. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 570,826 shares in the company, valued at approximately $231,823,855.12. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. In other Microsoft news, insider Bradford L. Smith sold 3,303 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $406.12, for a total value of $1,341,414.36. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 570,826 shares in the company, valued at approximately $231,823,855.12. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, EVP Kathleen T. Hogan sold 21,955 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, March 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $403.96, for a total transaction of $8,868,941.80. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president now owns 159,764 shares in the company, valued at $64,538,265.44. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last ninety days, insiders have sold 1,070,258 shares of company stock worth $30,690,456. 0.03% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Microsoft

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Lodestone Wealth Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 0.5% during the 3rd quarter. Lodestone Wealth Management LLC now owns 14,103 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $4,453,000 after purchasing an additional 68 shares during the last quarter. Caliber Wealth Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 3.7% during the 3rd quarter. Caliber Wealth Management LLC now owns 8,888 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $2,806,000 after purchasing an additional 316 shares during the last quarter. Wealthcare Advisory Partners LLC grew its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 1.3% during the 3rd quarter. Wealthcare Advisory Partners LLC now owns 65,525 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $20,689,000 after purchasing an additional 844 shares during the last quarter. McGuire Investment Group LLC grew its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 3.8% during the 3rd quarter. McGuire Investment Group LLC now owns 52,388 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $16,541,000 after purchasing an additional 1,922 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Kentucky Retirement Systems bought a new position in shares of Microsoft during the 3rd quarter valued at $188,066,000. Institutional investors own 71.13% of the company’s stock.

Microsoft Company Profile

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.