Conestoga Capital Advisors LLC Has $1.02 Million Stock Position in Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT)

Conestoga Capital Advisors LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) by 1.9% during the first quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 2,712 shares of the software giant’s stock after buying an additional 50 shares during the period. Conestoga Capital Advisors LLC’s holdings in Microsoft were worth $1,018,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its stake in Microsoft by 1.5% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 684,071,705 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $288,336,224,000 after purchasing an additional 10,431,988 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its holdings in Microsoft by 1.9% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 168,128,024 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $70,720,874,000 after acquiring an additional 3,103,212 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank bought a new stake in Microsoft in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $44,343,058,000. Northern Trust Corp lifted its stake in Microsoft by 16.1% in the fourth quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 83,787,746 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $35,316,535,000 after buying an additional 11,600,470 shares during the period. Finally, UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC raised its position in shares of Microsoft by 9.8% during the fourth quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 59,961,337 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $25,273,704,000 after purchasing an additional 5,370,546 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 71.13% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts have recently weighed in on the company. Royal Bank Of Canada reiterated an “outperform” rating and issued a $525.00 price objective on shares of Microsoft in a research report on Friday, May 23rd. Barclays boosted their price target on Microsoft from $494.00 to $550.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday. DA Davidson boosted their price target on Microsoft from $500.00 to $600.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 2nd. Jefferies Financial Group upped their price objective on Microsoft from $475.00 to $550.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, May 1st. Finally, Bank of America upped their price objective on Microsoft from $515.00 to $585.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twenty-nine have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, Microsoft currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $543.79.

Insider Transactions at Microsoft

In other news, EVP Amy Coleman sold 13,243 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, May 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $452.01, for a total transaction of $5,985,968.43. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president directly owned 43,100 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $19,481,631. The trade was a 23.50% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, EVP Kathleen T. Hogan sold 21,500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, May 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $453.77, for a total value of $9,756,055.00. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president owned 134,888 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $61,208,127.76. This represents a 13.75% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 135,743 shares of company stock worth $60,224,683 over the last ninety days. 0.03% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Microsoft Stock Up 0.0%

Shares of MSFT opened at $510.06 on Tuesday. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $477.78 and its 200 day simple moving average is $428.61. Microsoft Corporation has a 52 week low of $344.79 and a 52 week high of $514.64. The firm has a market cap of $3.79 trillion, a P/E ratio of 39.42, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.32 and a beta of 1.04. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.12, a quick ratio of 1.36 and a current ratio of 1.37.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, April 30th. The software giant reported $3.46 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.22 by $0.24. Microsoft had a net margin of 35.79% and a return on equity of 32.74%. The business had revenue of $70.07 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $68.54 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $2.94 EPS. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 13.3% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, analysts forecast that Microsoft Corporation will post 13.08 earnings per share for the current year.

Microsoft Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, September 11th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, August 21st will be given a dividend of $0.83 per share. This represents a $3.32 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.65%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, August 21st. Microsoft’s payout ratio is 25.66%.

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.