Microsoft Corporation $MSFT Shares Sold by Torray Investment Partners LLC

Torray Investment Partners LLC cut its stake in shares of Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) by 3.1% in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 35,530 shares of the software giant’s stock after selling 1,151 shares during the quarter. Microsoft makes up approximately 2.5% of Torray Investment Partners LLC’s portfolio, making the stock its 15th biggest position. Torray Investment Partners LLC’s holdings in Microsoft were worth $18,403,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in shares of Microsoft in the 2nd quarter valued at $50,493,678,000. Kingstone Capital Partners Texas LLC increased its holdings in Microsoft by 564,387.1% in the second quarter. Kingstone Capital Partners Texas LLC now owns 90,549,369 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $45,040,162,000 after buying an additional 90,533,328 shares during the last quarter. Nuveen LLC acquired a new stake in Microsoft in the first quarter valued at $18,733,827,000. Laurel Wealth Advisors LLC lifted its holdings in Microsoft by 49,640.3% during the 2nd quarter. Laurel Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 29,967,038 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $14,905,904,000 after buying an additional 29,906,791 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in shares of Microsoft by 2.0% during the 2nd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 705,077,786 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $350,712,742,000 after acquiring an additional 13,691,572 shares in the last quarter. 71.13% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities research analysts have recently weighed in on the company. Sanford C. Bernstein raised their target price on Microsoft from $637.00 to $645.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 30th. Rothschild & Co Redburn cut their price objective on shares of Microsoft from $500.00 to $450.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday. Arete Research upped their target price on shares of Microsoft from $710.00 to $730.00 in a report on Monday, October 27th. DZ Bank reiterated a “buy” rating on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Thursday, October 30th. Finally, Wolfe Research reduced their price target on shares of Microsoft from $675.00 to $625.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, December 15th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-five have assigned a Buy rating and three have issued a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Microsoft presently has an average rating of “Buy” and a consensus price target of $618.18.

Insider Transactions at Microsoft

In other Microsoft news, CEO Judson Althoff sold 12,750 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, December 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $491.52, for a total value of $6,266,880.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 129,349 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $63,577,620.48. The trade was a 8.97% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, EVP Takeshi Numoto sold 2,850 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, December 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $478.72, for a total transaction of $1,364,352.00. Following the transaction, the executive vice president owned 55,782 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $26,703,959.04. The trade was a 4.86% 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 over the last 90 days. 0.03% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Trending Headlines about Microsoft

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%

NASDAQ MSFT opened at $465.95 on Friday. The firm’s fifty day moving average is $478.69 and its two-hundred day moving average is $501.18. Microsoft Corporation has a one year low of $344.79 and a one year high of $555.45. 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 firm has a market cap of $3.46 trillion, a PE ratio of 33.14, a P/E/G ratio of 1.82 and a beta of 1.07.

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 the consensus estimate of $3.65 by $0.48. The business had revenue of $77.67 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $75.49 billion. Microsoft had a net margin of 35.71% and a return on equity of 32.45%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 18.4% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $3.30 earnings per share. Analysts expect that Microsoft Corporation will post 13.08 earnings per share for the current year.

Microsoft Dividend Announcement

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

About Microsoft

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).