Microsoft Corporation $MSFT is Yelin Lapidot Holdings Management Ltd.’s 6th Largest Position

Yelin Lapidot Holdings Management Ltd. grew its holdings in Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) by 3.2% during the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 43,687 shares of the software giant’s stock after acquiring an additional 1,372 shares during the period. Microsoft accounts for 4.8% of Yelin Lapidot Holdings Management Ltd.’s portfolio, making the stock its 6th largest holding. Yelin Lapidot Holdings Management Ltd.’s holdings in Microsoft were worth $22,628,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of the business. Norges Bank bought a new stake in shares of Microsoft during the 2nd quarter valued at $50,493,678,000. Nuveen LLC purchased a new stake in Microsoft in the 1st quarter worth $18,733,827,000. Laurel Wealth Advisors LLC raised its holdings in Microsoft by 49,640.3% during the second quarter. Laurel Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 29,967,038 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $14,905,904,000 after acquiring an additional 29,906,791 shares during the period. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Microsoft by 2.0% in the second 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 during the period. Finally, Northern Trust Corp grew its position in shares of Microsoft by 16.1% during the fourth quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 83,787,746 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $35,316,535,000 after purchasing an additional 11,600,470 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 71.13% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Microsoft news, CEO Judson Althoff sold 12,750 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, December 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $491.52, for a total value of $6,266,880.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer owned 129,349 shares in the company, valued at $63,577,620.48. This trade represents a 8.97% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, EVP Takeshi Numoto sold 2,850 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction on Thursday, December 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $478.72, for a total value of $1,364,352.00. Following the sale, the executive vice president owned 55,782 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $26,703,959.04. This trade represents a 4.86% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. 0.03% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

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

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms have weighed in on MSFT. Cantor Fitzgerald restated an “overweight” rating and issued a $590.00 price target on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Thursday. Wolfe Research reduced their price objective on Microsoft from $625.00 to $530.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday. Wall Street Zen lowered shares of Microsoft from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Sunday, January 18th. TD Cowen reaffirmed a “buy” rating on shares of Microsoft in a research note 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, January 27th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, forty have issued a Buy rating and three have given a Hold rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, Microsoft currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $597.73.

Microsoft Trading Down 0.7%

Shares of MSFT opened at $430.29 on Monday. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $475.83 and its 200-day simple moving average is $499.62. The company has a market cap of $3.20 trillion, a P/E ratio of 26.91, a P/E/G ratio of 1.69 and a beta of 1.08. The company has a current ratio of 1.39, a quick ratio of 1.38 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.09. Microsoft Corporation has a twelve month low of $344.79 and a twelve month high of $555.45.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 28th. The software giant reported $4.14 EPS for the quarter, beating 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 company had revenue of $81.27 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $80.28 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $3.23 EPS. The firm’s revenue was up 16.7% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts expect that Microsoft Corporation will post 13.08 EPS for the current year.

Microsoft Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared 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 is Thursday, February 19th. Microsoft’s dividend payout ratio is presently 22.76%.

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).