Oracle (NYSE:ORCL) Stock Price Down 3.4% Following Analyst Downgrade

Oracle Corporation (NYSE:ORCL) was down 3.4% on Tuesday after Scotiabank lowered their price target on the stock from $260.00 to $220.00. Scotiabank currently has a sector outperform rating on the stock. Oracle traded as low as $151.90 and last traded at $154.65. Approximately 42,937,506 shares were traded during trading, an increase of 69% from the average daily volume of 25,463,674 shares. The stock had previously closed at $160.06.

Several other research firms have also commented on ORCL. Morgan Stanley reduced their price target on Oracle from $320.00 to $213.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, January 23rd. UBS Group reaffirmed a “buy” rating on shares of Oracle in a research note on Monday. Stephens boosted their target price on shares of Oracle from $208.00 to $331.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, October 17th. Barclays restated an “overweight” rating on shares of Oracle in a report on Monday. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. decreased their price objective on Oracle from $270.00 to $230.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, December 11th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-five have given a Buy rating, eleven have given a Hold rating and two have given a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, Oracle currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $297.89.

Insider Transactions at Oracle

In other news, Director Naomi O. Seligman sold 2,223 shares of Oracle stock in a transaction on Tuesday, December 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $196.61, for a total value of $437,064.03. Following the completion of the sale, the director directly owned 25,596 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,032,429.56. The trade was a 7.99% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, EVP Douglas A. Kehring sold 35,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, January 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $194.89, for a total value of $6,821,150.00. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president owned 33,638 shares in the company, valued at $6,555,709.82. This represents a 50.99% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. In the last ninety days, insiders have sold 62,223 shares of company stock valued at $12,136,764. Corporate insiders own 40.90% of the company’s stock.

Key Oracle News

Here are the key news stories impacting Oracle this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Financing clarity relieved some credit concerns: Oracle’s plan to raise up to $45–50B to fund its AI/data-center expansion has been framed by some banks as a clearing event that reduces immediate credit-risk uncertainty; 5-year CDS levels fell sharply and some analysts see the plan as buy-side relief. CNBC: Oracle’s credit default swaps are plummeting after financing plans
• Positive Sentiment: Investor demand for bonds looks strong — the company’s bond offering drew heavy demand, signaling fixed‑income investors are willing to fund Oracle’s buildout, which supports execution of the AI-capacity strategy. TipRanks: $25B bond offering attracts heavy demand
• Neutral Sentiment: Strategic rationale — large capex is validating long-term AI infrastructure positioning: coverage arguing Oracle’s $50B program (including power solutions such as SMRs) elevates OCI from a commodity play to a strategic infrastructure provider, supporting a longer-term growth thesis even as near-term execution risk rises. MarketBeat: The Atomic Pivot: AI’s $50 Billion Power Move
• Neutral Sentiment: Analysts remain mixed but not uniformly negative — some firms (e.g., Barclays) reiterated Overweight, citing financing clarity and long-term upside, while others are re‑rating/adjusting models to account for capital mix. InsiderMonkey: Barclays reiterates Overweight
• Negative Sentiment: Dilution and debt concerns persist — some investors fear the scale and mix (debt vs. equity) of the $45–50B raise could dilute equity or increase leverage; that uncertainty has pressured the stock. Reuters: Shares fall as investors assess up to $50B plan
• Negative Sentiment: Market reaction to corporate commentary and OpenAI ties—Oracle’s public reassurances about OpenAI and related customer exposure failed to fully calm investors and may have triggered short-term selling. Fortune: Oracle defused ‘the key risk’, but market isn’t buying it
• Negative Sentiment: Legal and workforce risk: a Pomerantz investor probe and reports that Oracle may cut up to ~30,000 roles add headline risk and uncertainty around execution/costs. GlobeNewswire: Pomerantz investigates Oracle Yahoo: Oracle may slash up to 30,000 jobs

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Oracle

Institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the company. Norges Bank purchased a new position in shares of Oracle in the 2nd quarter valued at about $4,275,378,000. Jennison Associates LLC boosted its holdings in Oracle by 2,062.4% in the third quarter. Jennison Associates LLC now owns 9,227,252 shares of the enterprise software provider’s stock valued at $2,595,072,000 after purchasing an additional 8,800,546 shares in the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its stake in Oracle by 3.5% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 174,802,084 shares of the enterprise software provider’s stock valued at $34,070,674,000 after purchasing an additional 5,841,584 shares during the last quarter. American Century Companies Inc. raised its holdings in Oracle by 333.7% during the third quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 5,238,006 shares of the enterprise software provider’s stock worth $1,473,137,000 after purchasing an additional 4,030,382 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Invesco Ltd. raised its holdings in Oracle by 42.1% during the second quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 8,839,166 shares of the enterprise software provider’s stock worth $1,932,507,000 after purchasing an additional 2,619,722 shares in the last quarter. 42.44% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Oracle Stock Down 3.4%

The firm’s 50-day moving average price is $192.48 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $236.15. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.28, a quick ratio of 0.91 and a current ratio of 0.91. The firm has a market cap of $444.33 billion, a PE ratio of 29.07, a P/E/G ratio of 1.40 and a beta of 1.64.

Oracle (NYSE:ORCL) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, December 10th. The enterprise software provider reported $2.26 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.64 by $0.62. Oracle had a net margin of 25.28% and a return on equity of 70.60%. The firm had revenue of $16.06 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $16.19 billion. During the same period last year, the business earned $1.47 EPS. Oracle’s revenue for the quarter was up 14.2% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts expect that Oracle Corporation will post 5 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Oracle Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, January 23rd. Shareholders of record on Friday, January 9th were paid a $0.50 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Friday, January 9th. This represents a $2.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.3%. Oracle’s payout ratio is currently 37.59%.

About Oracle

Oracle Corporation is a multinational technology company that develops and sells database software, cloud engineered systems, enterprise software applications and related services. The company is widely known for its flagship Oracle Database and a portfolio of enterprise-grade software products that support data management, application development, analytics and middleware. Over recent years Oracle has expanded its focus to include cloud infrastructure and cloud applications, positioning itself as a provider of both platform and software-as-a-service solutions for large organizations.

Oracle’s product and service offerings include Oracle Database and the Autonomous Database, Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI), enterprise resource planning (ERP), human capital management (HCM) and supply chain management (SCM) cloud applications (often grouped under Oracle Fusion Cloud Applications), middleware such as WebLogic, and developer technologies including Java and MySQL.