PAX Financial Group LLC Increases Holdings in Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT)

PAX Financial Group LLC increased its stake in shares of Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT) by 15.5% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 11,660 shares of the software giant’s stock after acquiring an additional 1,563 shares during the quarter. PAX Financial Group LLC’s holdings in Microsoft were worth $4,915,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the company. WFA Asset Management Corp boosted its position in shares of Microsoft by 27.0% during the first quarter. WFA Asset Management Corp now owns 1,016 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $427,000 after purchasing an additional 216 shares in the last quarter. Ironwood Wealth Management LLC. boosted its position in shares of Microsoft by 0.3% during the second quarter. Ironwood Wealth Management LLC. now owns 12,658 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $5,658,000 after purchasing an additional 38 shares in the last quarter. Discipline Wealth Solutions LLC boosted its position in shares of Microsoft by 410.4% during the third quarter. Discipline Wealth Solutions LLC now owns 2,659 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $1,144,000 after purchasing an additional 2,138 shares in the last quarter. United Bank boosted its position in shares of Microsoft by 4.1% during the third quarter. United Bank now owns 18,378 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $7,908,000 after purchasing an additional 730 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Goldstream Capital Management Ltd boosted its position in shares of Microsoft by 10.3% during the third quarter. Goldstream Capital Management Ltd now owns 57,358 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $24,681,000 after purchasing an additional 5,349 shares in the last quarter. 71.13% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research analysts have issued reports on MSFT shares. KeyCorp reiterated a “sector weight” rating on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Thursday, April 17th. Evercore ISI set a $515.00 price objective on Microsoft and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, May 21st. Guggenheim restated a “neutral” rating on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Thursday, May 1st. Royal Bank of Canada restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $525.00 price target on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Friday, May 23rd. Finally, Barclays boosted their price target on Microsoft from $430.00 to $494.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, May 1st. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirty-one have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $513.59.

Insider Activity at Microsoft

In other news, insider Bradford L. Smith sold 75,000 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction dated Friday, May 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $436.05, for a total transaction of $32,703,750.00. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 476,999 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $207,995,413.95. This trade represents a 13.59% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, EVP Takeshi Numoto sold 3,000 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, June 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $463.00, for a total transaction of $1,389,000.00. Following the sale, the executive vice president now owns 43,930 shares in the company, valued at approximately $20,339,590. This represents a 6.39% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 135,743 shares of company stock worth $60,224,683. Corporate insiders own 0.03% of the company’s stock.

Microsoft Stock Performance

Shares of MSFT stock opened at $472.75 on Tuesday. The company has a market capitalization of $3.51 trillion, a P/E ratio of 38.06, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.21 and a beta of 1.03. Microsoft Co. has a 52 week low of $344.79 and a 52 week high of $473.43. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.13, a quick ratio of 1.34 and a current ratio of 1.35. The company’s 50 day moving average price is $419.01 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $417.09.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, April 30th. The software giant reported $3.46 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.22 by $0.24. Microsoft had a net margin of 35.43% and a return on equity of 33.36%. The business had revenue of $70.07 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $68.54 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $2.94 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 13.3% on a year-over-year basis. On average, analysts expect that Microsoft Co. will post 13.08 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

About Microsoft

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.