BCS Wealth Management Sells 3,242 Shares of Microsoft Corporation $MSFT

BCS Wealth Management lessened its stake in Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) by 36.6% during the third quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 5,627 shares of the software giant’s stock after selling 3,242 shares during the period. BCS Wealth Management’s holdings in Microsoft were worth $2,915,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Longfellow Investment Management Co. LLC boosted its stake in shares of Microsoft by 51.3% in the 2nd quarter. Longfellow Investment Management Co. LLC now owns 59 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $29,000 after purchasing an additional 20 shares during the last quarter. Westend Capital Management LLC raised its stake in Microsoft by 386.7% during the second quarter. Westend Capital Management LLC now owns 73 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $36,000 after buying an additional 58 shares during the last quarter. LSV Asset Management bought a new position in Microsoft during the fourth quarter worth $44,000. University of Illinois Foundation acquired a new position in Microsoft in the second quarter valued at $50,000. Finally, ROSS JOHNSON & Associates LLC boosted its position in Microsoft by 155.7% during the first quarter. ROSS JOHNSON & Associates LLC now owns 156 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $59,000 after acquiring an additional 95 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 71.13% of the company’s stock.

Key Microsoft News

Here are the key news stories impacting Microsoft this week:

• Positive Sentiment: New AI and robotics announcements — Microsoft unveiled robotics/agentic AI initiatives and pushed further into agentic AI for retail and frontline use, boosting enthusiasm that its product roadmap will translate into revenue from AI workloads. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Defense cloud contract — Microsoft won a sizable Air Force Cloud One task order (~$170M) that validates Azure’s position in government/defense spending and provides a tangible near‑term revenue win. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Investor reassessment of valuation — After recent weakness MSFT is seeing a rebound as analysts and market commentators highlight Microsoft’s relative growth, profitability and balance‑sheet strength versus software peers. That sentiment helped the stock move back up today. Read More.
• Neutral Sentiment: Analyst reaffirmations and mixed targets — Several firms (Jefferies, Guggenheim, UBS) kept Buy ratings even as many groups trimmed price targets; that leaves a mix of support and pressure in the tape heading into earnings. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Multiple price‑target cuts and downgrades — A wave of target trims (Cantor Fitzgerald, Wells Fargo adjustments, Rothschild/Redburn cuts and other downgrades) is adding selling pressure and keeps expectations muted into the Jan. 28 earnings print. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Service outages and security/privacy headlines — Recent widespread Microsoft 365/Outlook outages disrupted customers and raised reliability concerns; separate reports about providing BitLocker recovery keys to the FBI introduce potential reputational/privacy scrutiny. Read More.

Microsoft Trading Up 3.3%

Shares of MSFT stock opened at $465.95 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.10, a quick ratio of 1.39 and a current ratio of 1.40. The company has a market capitalization of $3.46 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 33.14, a PEG ratio of 1.82 and a beta of 1.07. Microsoft Corporation has a 52-week low of $344.79 and a 52-week high of $555.45. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $478.69 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $501.18.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, October 29th. The software giant reported $4.13 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.65 by $0.48. The firm had revenue of $77.67 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $75.49 billion. Microsoft had a return on equity of 32.45% and a net margin of 35.71%.The company’s revenue was up 18.4% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $3.30 EPS. Research analysts anticipate that Microsoft Corporation will post 13.08 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Microsoft Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 12th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, February 19th will be paid a $0.91 dividend. This represents a $3.64 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.8%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, February 19th. Microsoft’s dividend payout ratio is 25.89%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Microsoft

In related news, EVP Takeshi Numoto sold 2,850 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Thursday, December 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $478.72, for a total transaction of $1,364,352.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president owned 55,782 shares in the company, valued at approximately $26,703,959.04. This represents a 4.86% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CEO Judson Althoff sold 12,750 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, December 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $491.52, for a total transaction of $6,266,880.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer owned 129,349 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $63,577,620.48. This trade represents a 8.97% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders sold 54,100 shares of company stock worth $27,598,872 in the last quarter. 0.03% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

MSFT has been the subject of several research analyst reports. Sanford C. Bernstein lifted their price objective on Microsoft from $637.00 to $645.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 30th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. reaffirmed a “buy” rating on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Wednesday, November 19th. Stifel Nicolaus set a $640.00 target price on Microsoft in a report on Thursday, October 30th. Cantor Fitzgerald dropped their price target on Microsoft from $639.00 to $590.00 in a research note on Thursday. Finally, Mizuho reduced their price objective on shares of Microsoft from $640.00 to $620.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-five have given a Buy rating and three have issued a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Buy” and an average price target of $618.18.

Microsoft Company Profile

Microsoft Corporation is a global technology company headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975 by Bill Gates and Paul Allen, Microsoft develops, licenses and supports a broad range of software products, services and devices for consumers, enterprises and governments worldwide. Its operations span personal computing, productivity software, cloud infrastructure, enterprise applications, developer tools and gaming.

Microsoft’s product portfolio includes the Windows operating system and the Microsoft 365 suite of productivity and collaboration tools (Office apps, Outlook, Teams).