Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership Has $863.93 Million Position in Salesforce Inc. $CRM

Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership boosted its stake in shares of Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) by 47.0% during the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 3,645,252 shares of the CRM provider’s stock after buying an additional 1,165,263 shares during the quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership owned approximately 0.38% of Salesforce worth $863,925,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in CRM. Marquette Asset Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Salesforce during the third quarter worth approximately $26,000. Evolution Wealth Management Inc. purchased a new position in Salesforce during the second quarter valued at approximately $27,000. Country Trust Bank grew its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 658.8% during the second quarter. Country Trust Bank now owns 129 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $35,000 after purchasing an additional 112 shares in the last quarter. Capital A Wealth Management LLC lifted its position in Salesforce by 40.9% in the 2nd quarter. Capital A Wealth Management LLC now owns 155 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $41,000 after buying an additional 45 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Kilter Group LLC purchased a new stake in Salesforce during the 2nd quarter valued at about $42,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Salesforce Price Performance

CRM opened at $198.68 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.18, a current ratio of 0.76 and a quick ratio of 0.76. The firm has a market capitalization of $183.39 billion, a PE ratio of 25.44, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.41 and a beta of 1.29. The business’s 50-day moving average is $211.70 and its two-hundred day moving average is $235.53. Salesforce Inc. has a 1 year low of $174.57 and a 1 year high of $296.05.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 25th. The CRM provider reported $3.81 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.05 by $0.76. The business had revenue of $11.20 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $11.18 billion. Salesforce had a return on equity of 15.38% and a net margin of 17.96%.The company’s revenue was up 12.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $2.78 earnings per share. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 13.110-13.190 EPS and its Q1 2027 guidance at 3.110-3.130 EPS. Research analysts anticipate that Salesforce Inc. will post 7.46 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Salesforce Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, April 23rd. Investors of record on Thursday, April 9th will be issued a dividend of $0.44 per share. This represents a $1.76 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.9%. This is a boost from Salesforce’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.42. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 9th. Salesforce’s dividend payout ratio is 21.25%.

Insider Activity at Salesforce

In other news, Director Neelie Kroes sold 3,893 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, January 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $238.70, for a total transaction of $929,259.10. Following the sale, the director directly owned 7,299 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,742,271.30. This represents a 34.78% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, Director David Blair Kirk bought 1,936 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, December 17th. The shares were acquired at an average price of $258.64 per share, for a total transaction of $500,727.04. Following the completion of the transaction, the director directly owned 10,677 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,761,499.28. This trade represents a 22.15% increase in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this purchase is available in the SEC filing. 3.00% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Key Headlines Impacting Salesforce

Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Strong recent fundamentals and AI momentum bolster investor confidence—analysts and coverage pieces note Salesforce’s robust fiscal 2026 results and rising AI-driven demand that supported recent gains. CRM Stock Up More Than 5% in a Month: Should You Buy, Sell or Hold?
• Positive Sentiment: Product/GTMS initiatives: Salesforce is pushing contact-center modernization with Agentforce, which could drive upsells in Service Cloud and contact-center spend. Salesforce Aims to End the ‘Frankenstein’ Contact Center With Agentforce
• Positive Sentiment: Partner and integration momentum—third-party vendors (e.g., LivePerson, Cloudsquare integrations) are emphasizing Salesforce as the CRM backbone, which supports platform stickiness and ecosystem revenue. LivePerson Announces Event-driven Orchestration Partnership with Coral Active
• Positive Sentiment: Management outreach to investors: recent presentations at Morgan Stanley highlighted record fiscal 2026 performance and strategic priorities for 2027, helping sentiment. Salesforce (CRM) Presents at Morgan Stanley’s Conference, Here’s What You Need to Know
• Neutral Sentiment: Capital markets execution: Salesforce priced an underwritten offering of senior notes (aggregate $25B) with proceeds earmarked for buybacks—a definitive move but execution/terms will determine impact. Salesforce Prices Public Offering of Senior Notes
• Neutral Sentiment: Longer-term context pieces and competitor comparisons (Oracle, ServiceNow) highlight that Salesforce remains a cloud/AI market leader, but growth comparisons show mixed near-term organic trends. What If You Had Invested $1,000 in Oracle or Salesforce 10 Years Ago?
• Negative Sentiment: Tepid demand and higher yields on the $25B bond package have surfaced—reports show investor hesitation and higher required yields, signalling market concern about the leverage and pricing of debt-funded buybacks. Salesforce Sees Tepid Demand for Bond Sale to Fund Share Buyback
• Negative Sentiment: Credit and analyst pressure: rating agencies reacted to the buyback/debt move and some brokers issued downgrades or pessimistic forecasts—this increases financing costs and adds near-term downside risk. Salesforce Weighs Debt Funded Buybacks And Partner Cloud Against Valuation
• Negative Sentiment: Analyst downgrade and bearish notes have pressured sentiment, with some reports calling for lower near-term price targets. Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) Stock Price Down 2% on Analyst Downgrade

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several analysts recently weighed in on CRM shares. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut their price target on shares of Salesforce from $365.00 to $320.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, February 26th. Piper Sandler reaffirmed an “overweight” rating and issued a $250.00 price objective (down from $280.00) on shares of Salesforce in a report on Thursday, February 26th. Weiss Ratings reiterated a “hold (c)” rating on shares of Salesforce in a research report on Monday, December 29th. UBS Group decreased their price target on Salesforce from $260.00 to $200.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, February 17th. Finally, Mizuho dropped their price target on Salesforce from $280.00 to $265.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, February 26th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-seven have issued a Buy rating, eleven have issued a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Salesforce currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $282.06.

Salesforce Company Profile

Salesforce, founded in 1999 and headquartered in San Francisco, is a global provider of cloud-based software focused on customer relationship management (CRM) and enterprise applications. The company popularized the software-as-a-service (SaaS) model for CRM and has built a broad portfolio of products designed to help organizations manage sales, service, marketing, commerce and analytics through a unified, cloud-first platform.

Core offerings include Sales Cloud for sales automation, Service Cloud for customer support, Marketing Cloud for digital marketing and engagement, and Commerce Cloud for e-commerce.