Royal London Asset Management Ltd. Cuts Stake in Salesforce Inc. $CRM

Royal London Asset Management Ltd. lowered its holdings in shares of Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) by 14.3% during the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the SEC. The fund owned 207,381 shares of the CRM provider’s stock after selling 34,678 shares during the period. Royal London Asset Management Ltd.’s holdings in Salesforce were worth $32,488,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

Other large investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Commonwealth Retirement Investments LLC purchased a new stake in Salesforce during the fourth quarter valued at about $25,000. Gilpin Wealth Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of Salesforce in the fourth quarter worth about $26,000. Birchwood Financial Partners Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Salesforce in the fourth quarter worth about $28,000. Swiss RE Ltd. bought a new stake in shares of Salesforce in the 4th quarter valued at about $28,000. Finally, Dogwood Wealth Management LLC boosted its holdings in Salesforce by 285.7% during the 4th quarter. Dogwood Wealth Management LLC now owns 108 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $29,000 after acquiring an additional 80 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Salesforce News Summary

Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Strong quarterly beat and raised outlook: Salesforce reported adjusted EPS of $5.90 versus the $3.27 consensus estimate, while revenue rose 10.8% year over year to $11.35 billion, broadly topping expectations. Management raised its fiscal 2027 revenue outlook to approximately $46.1 billion-$46.4 billion and pointed to stronger bookings, lower attrition and potential organic growth reacceleration. Salesforce Stock Soars After Strong Results, Raised Outlook
• Positive Sentiment: AI partnership strengthens the growth narrative: Salesforce expanded its alliance with Anthropic, integrating Claude into Agentforce and launching “Claudeforce,” which places Salesforce CRM capabilities inside Claude. Investors viewed the agreement as evidence that Salesforce can monetize AI and benefit from rising usage; Agentforce and Data 360 annual recurring revenue approached $3.9 billion, with Agentforce ARR reaching about $1.5 billion. Salesforce Soars on Earnings Beat and AI Partnership
• Positive Sentiment: Analyst and institutional support: Wolfe Research upgraded CRM to “strong buy,” while several firms raised price targets, including Truist to $300, JPMorgan to $265 and Mizuho to $265. Heavy trading and reports of institutional buying suggest investors are reassessing the stock’s valuation and the broader software sector’s AI prospects.
• Neutral Sentiment: Profit quality warrants scrutiny: Strategic investment gains contributed $2.53 of the $5.90 adjusted EPS, including an estimated $2.7 billion unrealized gain tied to Salesforce’s Anthropic investment. This boosted reported earnings but may not represent recurring operating performance. Salesforce Stock Just Soared. Thank Anthropic.
• Negative Sentiment: Valuation and execution risks remain: After the rally, some analysts still see limited upside or downside, with UBS, Citi, Morgan Stanley and Wells Fargo retaining neutral or equivalent ratings. Critics also caution that Anthropic could control the AI orchestration layer, potentially limiting Salesforce’s long-term strategic leverage, while the rapid move may already price in much of the AI opportunity.

Salesforce Trading Up 1.8%

CRM opened at $256.60 on Friday. Salesforce Inc. has a one year low of $146.32 and a one year high of $269.11. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.02, a current ratio of 0.84 and a quick ratio of 0.79. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $181.24 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $182.55. The firm has a market capitalization of $210.16 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 23.39, a PEG ratio of 1.38 and a beta of 1.16.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, August 26th. The CRM provider reported $5.90 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.27 by $2.63. Salesforce had a return on equity of 24.90% and a net margin of 21.99%.The firm had revenue of $11.35 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $11.33 billion. During the same period last year, the company earned $2.91 EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 10.8% compared to the same quarter last year. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 16.670-16.710 EPS and its Q3 2027 guidance at 3.420-3.440 EPS. Analysts predict that Salesforce Inc. will post 12.77 EPS for the current year.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

CRM has been the topic of several recent research reports. Phillip Securities lowered Salesforce from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and reduced their price target for the stock from $253.00 to $166.00 in a research report on Monday, June 29th. Guggenheim reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $228.00 price objective on shares of Salesforce in a research report on Thursday. Mizuho increased their price objective on Salesforce from $250.00 to $265.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday. B. Riley Financial raised their target price on shares of Salesforce from $205.00 to $240.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, May 28th. Finally, Morgan Stanley lifted their target price on shares of Salesforce from $185.00 to $235.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Thursday. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-six have assigned a Buy rating, fifteen have given a Hold rating and three have issued a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, Salesforce currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $261.15.

Salesforce 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.