Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) Stock Price Up 0.1% After Analyst Upgrade

Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT) traded up 0.1% during trading on Wednesday after Wells Fargo & Company raised their price target on the stock from $460.00 to $480.00. Wells Fargo & Company currently has an overweight rating on the stock. Microsoft traded as high as $418.88 and last traded at $414.92. 3,884,831 shares changed hands during trading, a decline of 82% from the average session volume of 21,707,730 shares. The stock had previously closed at $414.58.

Other research analysts also recently issued research reports about the stock. Morgan Stanley raised their target price on shares of Microsoft from $465.00 to $520.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 11th. StockNews.com downgraded shares of Microsoft from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday, February 22nd. Piper Sandler reissued an “overweight” rating and set a $455.00 target price on shares of Microsoft in a research report on Thursday, January 25th. Macquarie boosted their target price on shares of Microsoft from $430.00 to $450.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, January 31st. Finally, DA Davidson reissued a “buy” rating and set a $500.00 target price on shares of Microsoft in a research report on Friday, March 15th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirty-six have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Microsoft currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $432.13.

Insider Buying and Selling at Microsoft

In other Microsoft news, EVP Kathleen T. Hogan sold 21,955 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, March 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $403.96, for a total transaction of $8,868,941.80. Following the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 159,764 shares in the company, valued at approximately $64,538,265.44. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. In related news, insider Bradford L. Smith sold 45,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, February 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $411.78, for a total value of $18,530,100.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now owns 574,129 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $236,414,839.62. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, EVP Kathleen T. Hogan sold 21,955 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, March 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $403.96, for a total transaction of $8,868,941.80. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 159,764 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $64,538,265.44. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 1,070,258 shares of company stock valued at $30,690,456. 0.03% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of MSFT. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in Microsoft by 2.4% in the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 664,908,939 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $250,032,357,000 after acquiring an additional 15,701,937 shares during the period. State Street Corp lifted its stake in Microsoft by 0.7% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 295,509,547 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $68,824,173,000 after purchasing an additional 1,951,554 shares during the last quarter. FMR LLC lifted its stake in Microsoft by 2.7% during the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 215,874,152 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $68,162,263,000 after purchasing an additional 5,762,902 shares during the last quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD lifted its stake in Microsoft by 0.3% during the second quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 195,859,819 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $50,302,677,000 after purchasing an additional 556,020 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Moneta Group Investment Advisors LLC lifted its stake in Microsoft by 112,158.6% during the fourth quarter. Moneta Group Investment Advisors LLC now owns 150,187,424 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $36,017,948,000 after purchasing an additional 150,053,637 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 71.13% of the company’s stock.

Microsoft Price Performance

The company has a 50 day moving average of $415.29 and a 200-day moving average of $384.29. The stock has a market capitalization of $3.00 trillion, a P/E ratio of 36.55, a PEG ratio of 2.20 and a beta of 0.89. The company has a quick ratio of 1.20, a current ratio of 1.22 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.19.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last issued its earnings results on Tuesday, January 30th. The software giant reported $2.93 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.76 by $0.17. Microsoft had a return on equity of 38.40% and a net margin of 36.27%. The firm had revenue of $62.02 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $61.14 billion. During the same period last year, the company earned $2.32 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 17.6% on a year-over-year basis. Sell-side analysts predict that Microsoft Co. will post 11.61 EPS for the current year.

Microsoft Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, June 13th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, May 16th will be given a $0.75 dividend. This represents a $3.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.74%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, May 15th. Microsoft’s dividend payout ratio is presently 27.12%.

Microsoft Company Profile

Microsoft Corporation develops and supports software, services, devices and solutions worldwide. The Productivity and Business Processes segment offers office, exchange, SharePoint, Microsoft Teams, office 365 Security and Compliance, Microsoft viva, and Microsoft 365 copilot; and office consumer services, such as Microsoft 365 consumer subscriptions, Office licensed on-premises, and other office services.