Phocas Financial Corp. Buys New Stake in Salesforce, Inc. (NYSE:CRM)

Phocas Financial Corp. bought a new stake in shares of Salesforce, Inc. (NYSE:CRM – Get Rating) in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor bought 960 shares of the CRM provider’s stock, valued at approximately $127,000.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of CRM. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD raised its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 40.6% in the second quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 46,707,038 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $7,708,529,000 after buying an additional 13,483,854 shares during the last quarter. Public Investment Fund purchased a new position in shares of Salesforce in the second quarter worth $437,393,000. DZ BANK AG Deutsche Zentral Genossenschafts Bank Frankfurt am Main raised its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 114.9% in the second quarter. DZ BANK AG Deutsche Zentral Genossenschafts Bank Frankfurt am Main now owns 3,881,056 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $640,566,000 after buying an additional 2,074,938 shares during the last quarter. PointState Capital LP purchased a new position in shares of Salesforce in the third quarter worth $181,700,000. Finally, Polen Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 12.5% in the third quarter. Polen Capital Management LLC now owns 11,057,687 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $1,590,538,000 after buying an additional 1,228,763 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.83% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research firms have issued reports on CRM. Cowen cut shares of Salesforce from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a report on Friday, January 20th. Citigroup raised their target price on shares of Salesforce from $182.00 to $210.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, March 3rd. Sanford C. Bernstein cut shares of Salesforce from a “market perform” rating to an “underperform” rating and reduced their target price for the stock from $134.00 to $119.00 in a report on Wednesday, January 11th. Truist Financial raised their target price on shares of Salesforce from $210.00 to $250.00 in a report on Thursday, March 2nd. Finally, DA Davidson raised their target price on shares of Salesforce from $150.00 to $180.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, March 2nd. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, twelve have assigned a hold rating, twenty-eight have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Salesforce presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $211.24.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Salesforce news, CEO Bret Steven Taylor sold 1,034 shares of Salesforce stock in a transaction dated Friday, December 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $128.55, for a total transaction of $132,920.70. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 901,195 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $115,848,617.25. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. In other Salesforce news, CEO Bret Steven Taylor sold 1,034 shares of Salesforce stock in a transaction dated Friday, December 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $128.55, for a total transaction of $132,920.70. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 901,195 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $115,848,617.25. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, insider Parker Harris sold 7,500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, March 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $188.18, for a total transaction of $1,411,350.00. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 96,795 shares in the company, valued at $18,214,883.10. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 39,268 shares of company stock valued at $6,641,547 over the last ninety days. Company insiders own 3.60% of the company’s stock.

Salesforce Stock Performance

CRM opened at $184.85 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $184.85 billion, a PE ratio of 880.28, a PEG ratio of 2.29 and a beta of 1.21. Salesforce, Inc. has a twelve month low of $126.34 and a twelve month high of $222.15. The firm’s 50-day moving average price is $166.43 and its 200 day moving average price is $153.81. The company has a current ratio of 1.02, a quick ratio of 1.02 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM – Get Rating) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, March 1st. The CRM provider reported $1.68 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.36 by $0.32. Salesforce had a net margin of 0.66% and a return on equity of 4.48%. The company had revenue of $8.38 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $7.99 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $0.24 earnings per share. Salesforce’s quarterly revenue was up 14.4% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that Salesforce, Inc. will post 4.77 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Salesforce announced that its board has initiated a share repurchase plan on Wednesday, March 1st that authorizes the company to repurchase $20.00 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the CRM provider to repurchase up to 10.9% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are generally a sign that the company’s board believes its shares are undervalued.

Salesforce Profile

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Salesforce, Inc engages in the design and development of cloud-based enterprise software for customer relationship management. Its solutions include sales force automation, customer service and support, marketing automation, digital commerce, community management, collaboration, industry-specific solutions, and salesforce platform.