Cantor Fitzgerald Lowers Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) Price Target to $590.00

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) had its target price cut by stock analysts at Cantor Fitzgerald from $639.00 to $590.00 in a research note issued to investors on Thursday,MarketScreener reports. Cantor Fitzgerald’s target price suggests a potential upside of 26.62% from the company’s current price.

Several other research firms have also recently issued reports on MSFT. Redburn Partners set a $450.00 price target on shares of Microsoft in a report on Wednesday. Melius Research raised their price target on Microsoft from $595.00 to $625.00 in a report on Thursday, September 25th. Royal Bank Of Canada reaffirmed a “buy” rating on shares of Microsoft in a report on Monday, January 5th. BMO Capital Markets decreased their target price on shares of Microsoft from $650.00 to $625.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, October 30th. Finally, Guggenheim reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $586.00 price objective on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Thursday. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-five have given a Buy rating and three have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Microsoft presently has an average rating of “Buy” and a consensus target price of $618.18.

Microsoft Stock Up 3.3%

MSFT opened at $465.95 on Thursday. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $478.69 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $501.18. Microsoft has a 52 week low of $344.79 and a 52 week high of $555.45. The company 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. The company has a quick ratio of 1.39, a current ratio of 1.40 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.10.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last issued its quarterly 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 firm had revenue of $77.67 billion during 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 for the quarter was up 18.4% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the company earned $3.30 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts anticipate that Microsoft will post 13.08 EPS for the current year.

Insider Transactions at Microsoft

In other Microsoft news, insider Bradford L. Smith sold 38,500 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $518.64, for a total value of $19,967,640.00. Following the completion of the sale, the insider owned 461,597 shares in the company, valued at $239,402,668.08. The trade was a 7.70% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, EVP Takeshi Numoto sold 2,850 shares of the stock in a transaction dated 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 in the company, valued at approximately $26,703,959.04. The trade was a 4.86% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders have sold 54,100 shares of company stock worth $27,598,872 over the last quarter. 0.03% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Trading of Microsoft

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in MSFT. AlphaQuest LLC raised its stake in shares of Microsoft by 5.9% in the 2nd quarter. AlphaQuest LLC now owns 342 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $170,000 after acquiring an additional 19 shares during the period. BLVD Private Wealth LLC boosted its position in shares of Microsoft by 0.6% in the third quarter. BLVD Private Wealth LLC now owns 3,169 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $1,641,000 after buying an additional 19 shares during the period. PMV Capital Advisers LLC raised its stake in shares of Microsoft by 5.9% during the second quarter. PMV Capital Advisers LLC now owns 359 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $178,000 after purchasing an additional 20 shares during the period. Seek First Inc. lifted its position in shares of Microsoft by 1.5% during the second quarter. Seek First Inc. now owns 1,358 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $675,000 after purchasing an additional 20 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Level Financial Advisors grew its holdings in Microsoft by 0.8% during the 2nd quarter. Level Financial Advisors now owns 2,680 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $1,333,000 after purchasing an additional 20 shares in the last quarter. 71.13% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

More 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 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).