Northstar Group Inc. Makes New Investment in Salesforce Inc. $CRM

Northstar Group Inc. purchased a new stake in Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) in the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The fund purchased 5,492 shares of the CRM provider’s stock, valued at approximately $860,000.

Several other large investors have also modified their holdings of CRM. Fred Alger Management LLC boosted its position in shares of Salesforce by 0.3% in the third quarter. Fred Alger Management LLC now owns 14,943 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $3,548,000 after acquiring an additional 45 shares during the last quarter. Richards Merrill & Peterson Inc. increased its position in Salesforce by 1.1% during the fourth quarter. Richards Merrill & Peterson Inc. now owns 4,239 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $1,123,000 after purchasing an additional 46 shares during the last quarter. Wright Investors Service Inc. raised its stake in Salesforce by 0.8% during the fourth quarter. Wright Investors Service Inc. now owns 6,186 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $1,639,000 after purchasing an additional 47 shares during the period. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC raised its stake in Salesforce by 6.9% during the fourth quarter. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC now owns 745 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $197,000 after purchasing an additional 48 shares during the period. Finally, Synergy Financial Group LTD boosted its holdings in shares of Salesforce by 2.4% in the 3rd quarter. Synergy Financial Group LTD now owns 2,035 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $482,000 after purchasing an additional 48 shares during the last quarter. 80.43% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Salesforce News Summary

Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:

• Positive Sentiment: JPMorgan resumed coverage with an Overweight rating and a $250 price target, citing potential acceleration in Salesforce’s core business during the second half of the year. The target implies more than 24% upside from recent levels. JPMorgan bullish Salesforce coverage
• Positive Sentiment: Monness Crespi & Hardt raised its Salesforce price target to $222 from $200 and maintained a Buy rating. UBS and Wells Fargo also reportedly forecast strong appreciation, reinforcing improving sell-side sentiment. Monness Crespi Salesforce price target
• Positive Sentiment: Salesforce’s Agentforce platform is gaining traction, giving the company a way to use its large CRM customer base to compete with Microsoft and Oracle in enterprise “agentic” AI. Salesforce agentic AI analysis
• Positive Sentiment: A Seeking Alpha analysis argues that Salesforce’s $27.1 billion share-repurchase program, equivalent to an estimated 23% net buyback yield, could support earnings-per-share growth. The stock also appears inexpensive at roughly 14 times forward earnings, although buybacks have increased debt. Salesforce buyback analysis
• Neutral Sentiment: Salesforce has recently posted strong momentum, with reports noting three consecutive weeks of gains and substantial one-month appreciation. That run may be encouraging investors, but it also raises the possibility of profit-taking.
• Negative Sentiment: Parnassus Investments indicated that Salesforce has lost favor as AI opportunities shift toward competing or substitute technologies. Other commentary likewise warns that alternative software and AI-native tools threaten Salesforce’s traditional CRM franchise. Salesforce AI competition concerns

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several analysts have recently issued reports on the stock. Truist Financial cut shares of Salesforce from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 1st. B. Riley Financial lifted their target price on Salesforce from $205.00 to $240.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, May 28th. Roth Capital reissued a “buy” rating and set a $325.00 price target on shares of Salesforce in a research report on Thursday, May 28th. DA Davidson dropped their price target on Salesforce from $200.00 to $175.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, May 28th. Finally, Phillip Securities downgraded Salesforce from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and cut their price objective for the stock from $253.00 to $166.00 in a report on Monday, June 29th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-five have issued a Buy rating, seventeen have issued a Hold rating and three have given a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $249.05.

Salesforce Stock Performance

Shares of CRM stock opened at $195.86 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 0.79, a quick ratio of 0.79 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.15. The company has a market cap of $160.41 billion, a PE ratio of 22.67, a P/E/G ratio of 1.09 and a beta of 1.16. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $171.41 and its 200-day simple moving average is $182.28. Salesforce Inc. has a 52 week low of $146.32 and a 52 week high of $269.11.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last announced its quarterly earnings results 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 firm had revenue of $11.13 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $11.05 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $2.58 EPS. The firm’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 anticipate that Salesforce Inc. will post 10.27 EPS for the current year.

Salesforce Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, July 2nd. Stockholders of record on Thursday, June 11th were given a $0.44 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, June 11th. This represents a $1.76 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.9%. Salesforce’s dividend payout ratio is presently 20.37%.

About Salesforce

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.