Microsoft Corporation $MSFT is Mount Vernon Associates Inc. MD’s 2nd Largest Position

Mount Vernon Associates Inc. MD trimmed its stake in shares of Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) by 8.4% during the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 22,515 shares of the software giant’s stock after selling 2,062 shares during the quarter. Microsoft makes up 8.1% of Mount Vernon Associates Inc. MD’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 2nd largest position. Mount Vernon Associates Inc. MD’s holdings in Microsoft were worth $11,662,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. WFA Asset Management Corp raised its stake in Microsoft by 27.0% in the first quarter. WFA Asset Management Corp now owns 1,016 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $427,000 after buying an additional 216 shares in the last quarter. Ironwood Wealth Management LLC. lifted its stake in shares of Microsoft by 0.3% in the 2nd 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 during the period. 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. Wealth Group Ltd. grew its stake in Microsoft by 1.2% in the fourth quarter. Wealth Group Ltd. now owns 2,374 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $1,000,000 after purchasing an additional 28 shares during the period. Finally, Eagle Capital Management LLC lifted its position in Microsoft by 0.4% during the fourth quarter. Eagle Capital Management LLC now owns 23,097 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $9,735,000 after buying an additional 96 shares during the period. 71.13% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Microsoft Stock Performance

Shares of MSFT opened at $430.29 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $3.20 trillion, a P/E ratio of 26.91, a PEG ratio of 1.74 and a beta of 1.07. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.09, a current ratio of 1.39 and a quick ratio of 1.39. Microsoft Corporation has a one year low of $344.79 and a one year high of $555.45. The business has a fifty day moving average of $475.83 and a 200 day moving average of $499.71.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 28th. The software giant reported $4.14 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.86 by $0.28. Microsoft had a net margin of 39.04% and a return on equity of 32.34%. The business had revenue of $81.27 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $80.28 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $3.23 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 16.7% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Microsoft Corporation will post 13.08 EPS for the current year.

Microsoft Dividend Announcement

The company 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. This represents a $3.64 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.8%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, February 19th. Microsoft’s payout ratio is 22.76%.

Trending Headlines about Microsoft

Here are the key news stories impacting Microsoft this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Large commercial deals and partnerships underpin continued demand — Microsoft landed a major cloud customer agreement (Perplexity, reported as a $750M deal), which demonstrates Azure can win sizable AI workloads and supports future revenue. Perplexity signs $750 million AI cloud deal with Microsoft
• Positive Sentiment: Long-term AI opportunity remains large — analysts and commentators note that potential liquidity events (e.g., an OpenAI IPO) and continued hyperscaler AI demand could boost infrastructure spending that benefits Microsoft’s cloud and services over time. Could A $1 Trillion OpenAI IPO Save The Day For Nvidia, Microsoft?
• Positive Sentiment: Backlog/RPO growth signals demand — Microsoft’s commercial remaining performance obligations (backlog) jumped materially year-over-year, implying multi-year contracted revenue tied to AI workloads. Microsoft demand backlog doubles to $625 billion
• Neutral Sentiment: Quarterly results were solid but mixed — MSFT beat on revenue and EPS (Q2 results) yet the company issued guidance and commentary that implied a modest moderation in Azure growth vs. prior quarter; the market is parsing growth vs. the cost profile. Microsoft Q2 earnings beat on top and bottom lines
• Neutral Sentiment: Options and sentiment flows amplify moves — unusually high call-option buying and heavy volume have increased intraday volatility and may accentuate both selloffs and snapbacks. Stock Of The Day: Is This The Bottom For Microsoft?
• Negative Sentiment: Investor backlash to capex and margin risk — the core negative: investors punished MSFT because AI capex jumped (reported ~$37.5B in the quarter) while Azure growth showed signs of slowing, raising doubts about near-term returns. That drove a sharp selloff and a big market-cap contraction. Microsoft tumbled 10% in a day and isn’t recovering premarket. Here’s why
• Negative Sentiment: Analyst cuts & guidance uncertainty — several firms trimmed price targets or flagged near-term Azure/margin risks, increasing downside pressure even as many maintain buy ratings longer term. These Analysts Slash Their Forecasts On Microsoft Following Q2 Results
• Negative Sentiment: Legal/investor scrutiny follows the shock drop — law firms have opened investigations and class-action notices have surfaced, which can keep sentiment fragile near-term. Microsoft Corporation Investigated on Behalf of Investors

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CEO Judson Althoff sold 12,750 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on 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 directly owned 129,349 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $63,577,620.48. This represents a 8.97% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, EVP Takeshi Numoto sold 2,850 shares of the stock in a transaction on 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 transaction, the executive vice president owned 55,782 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $26,703,959.04. This trade represents a 4.86% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 54,100 shares of company stock worth $27,598,872. Corporate insiders own 0.03% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages recently issued reports on MSFT. Scotiabank dropped their price objective on shares of Microsoft from $650.00 to $600.00 and set a “sector outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday. DZ Bank reaffirmed a “buy” rating on shares of Microsoft in a research report on Thursday. Stifel Nicolaus set a $540.00 target price on Microsoft in a research note on Thursday. Sanford C. Bernstein reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $641.00 price target (down previously from $645.00) on shares of Microsoft in a research report on Thursday. Finally, BNP Paribas Exane increased their price objective on shares of Microsoft from $632.00 to $659.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Tuesday. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty have given a Buy rating and three have given a Hold rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $597.73.

Microsoft 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).