Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) Shares Up 1.7% – Here’s What Happened

Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) shares shot up 1.7% during trading on Thursday . The stock traded as high as $167.21 and last traded at $165.9390. 10,315,218 shares traded hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 26% from the average daily volume of 14,028,688 shares. The stock had previously closed at $163.23.

More Salesforce News

Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Guggenheim upgraded Salesforce to Buy from Hold/Neutral and set a $228 price target, saying recent weakness has created an attractive entry point. The move helped drive shares higher. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Citizens reiterated a Market Outperform rating and a $315 target following Salesforce’s Fin acquisition and continued Agentforce expansion, reinforcing the bullish AI-growth narrative. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: Analysts remain broadly constructive, with Salesforce carrying a consensus “Moderate Buy” rating, suggesting Street sentiment is still supportive despite recent volatility. Article Title
• Positive Sentiment: New commentary says Data 360 momentum, AI-driven ARR growth, and potential Informatica synergies could support stronger fiscal 2027 revenue growth as customer demand expands. Article Title
• Neutral Sentiment: Several market writeups frame the recent pullback as a possible buying opportunity, but they mainly reinforce the same valuation-and-growth debate rather than introduce new fundamentals. Article Title
• Negative Sentiment: Salesforce remains down sharply over the past month and had a weak June, showing the market is still worried about slowing momentum and AI-related execution risk. Article Title

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

CRM has been the subject of a number of recent analyst reports. TD Cowen reissued a “buy” rating on shares of Salesforce in a report on Friday, June 12th. Roth Mkm reissued a “buy” rating and set a $325.00 price objective on shares of Salesforce in a report on Thursday, May 28th. Sanford C. Bernstein dropped their target price on shares of Salesforce from $194.00 to $173.00 and set an “underperform” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, May 28th. Macquarie Infrastructure reduced their price target on shares of Salesforce from $200.00 to $190.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, May 28th. Finally, Northland Securities lowered their price target on Salesforce from $267.00 to $229.00 and set a “market perform” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, March 10th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-eight have given a Buy rating, twelve have issued a Hold rating and four have issued a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $254.42.

Salesforce Stock Up 1.7%

The company has a market cap of $135.90 billion, a PE ratio of 19.21, a P/E/G ratio of 0.98 and a beta of 1.18. The company has a quick ratio of 0.79, a current ratio of 0.79 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.15. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $174.14 and its 200-day simple moving average is $198.62.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, May 27th. The CRM provider reported $3.88 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.13 by $0.75. Salesforce had a net margin of 18.73% and a return on equity of 18.72%. The business had revenue of $11.13 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $11.05 billion. During the same period last year, the company posted $2.58 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 13.3% on a year-over-year basis. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 14.060-14.120 EPS and its Q2 2027 guidance at 3.250-3.270 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts expect that Salesforce Inc. will post 10.29 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Salesforce Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, July 2nd. Investors of record on Thursday, June 11th will be paid a dividend of $0.44 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, June 11th. This represents a $1.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.1%. Salesforce’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 20.37%.

Salesforce announced that its board has approved a share repurchase plan on Monday, March 16th that authorizes the company to buyback $25.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the CRM provider to buy up to 14.1% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback plans are typically an indication that the company’s leadership believes its shares are undervalued.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Temasek Holdings Private Ltd increased its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 3.7% during the 4th quarter. Temasek Holdings Private Ltd now owns 683,790 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $181,143,000 after buying an additional 24,332 shares during the last quarter. SFE Investment Counsel grew its position in Salesforce by 82.7% during the fourth quarter. SFE Investment Counsel now owns 17,394 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $4,608,000 after acquiring an additional 7,871 shares during the period. Van ECK Associates Corp increased its stake in Salesforce by 8.9% during the third quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp now owns 1,299,513 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $307,984,000 after acquiring an additional 106,107 shares during the last quarter. Eminence Capital LP increased its stake in Salesforce by 5.6% during the third quarter. Eminence Capital LP now owns 830,536 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $196,837,000 after acquiring an additional 43,888 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Hilton Head Capital Partners LLC acquired a new position in shares of Salesforce in the 4th quarter valued at about $997,000. 80.43% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

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.