Salesforce Inc. $CRM Stock: Parallel Advisors LLC Trims Holdings

Parallel Advisors LLC decreased its stake in Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) by 11.9% in the 3rd quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund owned 44,899 shares of the CRM provider’s stock after selling 6,045 shares during the quarter. Parallel Advisors LLC’s holdings in Salesforce were worth $10,307,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of the stock. BlackRock Inc. bought a new stake in Salesforce during the second quarter worth about $11,396,844,000. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership grew its stake in Salesforce by 130.2% in the first quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 12,659,217 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $2,363,096,000 after purchasing an additional 7,160,302 shares in the last quarter. Bank of America Corp DE bought a new position in Salesforce in the second quarter valued at approximately $1,914,086,000. Legal & General Group Plc acquired a new position in shares of Salesforce during the 2nd quarter worth approximately $927,332,000. Finally, Bank of New York Mellon Corp acquired a new position in shares of Salesforce during the 2nd quarter worth approximately $844,928,000. Institutional investors own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities research analysts have recently issued reports on CRM shares. Wolfe Research upgraded Salesforce from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 27th. Canaccord Genuity Group raised their target price on shares of Salesforce from $270.00 to $300.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, September 17th. Cantor Fitzgerald restated an “overweight” rating and set a $300.00 target price on shares of Salesforce in a report on Wednesday, October 21st. Freedom Broker upped their price target on shares of Salesforce from $230.00 to $295.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, September 17th. Finally, Truist Financial reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $300.00 price target (up from $280.00) on shares of Salesforce in a research note on Thursday, August 27th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-two have given a Buy rating, thirteen have given a Hold rating and three have issued a Sell rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $278.98.

More Salesforce News

Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Salesforce’s planned acquisition of AI voice-agent company Cresta could strengthen Agentforce and Service Cloud, adding capabilities for customer-service automation. The deal also brings acquisition costs and execution risks. Article: Salesforce Bets on AI Voice Agents With Planned Cresta Acquisition
• Positive Sentiment: Zacks Research upgraded Salesforce from “hold” to “strong buy,” a favorable analyst signal that may help counter near-term concerns. Article: Zacks Research rating
• Neutral Sentiment: Salesforce is expanding its Coworker offering and promoting a 21-times growth claim, but the report notes that no baseline is provided, making the figure difficult to assess. Article: Salesforce Expands Coworker’s Reach, but Its 21× Growth Claim Has No Baseline
• Neutral Sentiment: The company is extending Agent Fabric to help businesses manage AI agents across platforms. Its large customer base and reported 1.2 billion daily requests suggest potential, but investors still need evidence that the AI activity will translate into meaningful revenue. Article: Salesforce Stock: The 1 Number Investors Still Need to See
• Negative Sentiment: A broader software sell-off is weighing on CRM, while S&P Global Ratings cut Salesforce’s credit rating to A from A+. S&P cited acquisition spending and a $25 billion debt-financed buyback, which lifted pro forma net debt relative to EBITDA above its previous downgrade threshold. The rating action raises concerns about leverage and aggressive capital allocation. Article: S&P cuts Salesforce to A on rising acquisition debt and buybacks

Salesforce Stock Performance

CRM traded down $8.45 during trading hours on Friday, reaching $213.96. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 6,708,466 shares, compared to its average volume of 7,142,592. The company’s 50-day moving average is $239.53 and its 200-day moving average is $198.64. Salesforce Inc. has a 52 week low of $146.32 and a 52 week high of $269.11. The firm has a market cap of $176.09 billion, a PE ratio of 19.50, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.03 and a beta of 1.24. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.02, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a current ratio of 0.84.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, August 26th. The CRM provider reported $5.90 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.27 by $2.63. Salesforce had a net margin of 21.99% and a return on equity of 24.90%. The firm had revenue of $11.35 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $11.33 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $2.91 earnings per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter 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. On average, equities analysts forecast that Salesforce Inc. will post 12.82 EPS for the current year.

Salesforce Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, October 8th. Investors of record on Thursday, September 17th were issued a dividend of $0.44 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, September 17th. This represents a $1.76 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.8%. Salesforce’s payout ratio is presently 16.04%.

Insider Transactions at Salesforce

In related news, Director Craig Conway sold 4,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, September 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $260.61, for a total value of $1,172,745.00. Following the transaction, the director owned 5,437 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,416,936.57. This represents a 45.29% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, Director David Blair Kirk acquired 4,176 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, September 18th. The shares were bought at an average price of $239.33 per share, with a total value of $999,442.08. Following the completion of the transaction, the director directly owned 18,748 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,486,958.84. The trade was a 28.66% increase in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this purchase is available in the SEC filing. 3.50% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Salesforce Company Profile

Salesforce, Inc is a cloud-based software company best known for customer relationship management (CRM) tools. Its platform helps businesses manage sales, customer service, marketing, commerce and customer data, and includes products such as Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Data Cloud and Agentforce.

The company also offers Slack for workplace collaboration, Tableau for data analytics and visualization, and MuleSoft for connecting applications and data. Salesforce’s products are used by organizations across a range of industries and are available to customers around the world.

Founded in 1999 by Marc Benioff and other co-founders, Salesforce is headquartered in San Francisco.