Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) Upgraded at StockNews.com

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) was upgraded by equities researchers at StockNews.com from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note issued to investors on Wednesday.

Several other research firms also recently issued reports on MSFT. Truist Financial restated a “buy” rating and set a $600.00 price objective on shares of Microsoft in a report on Monday, October 28th. Cantor Fitzgerald started coverage on Microsoft in a report on Friday, January 17th. They set an “overweight” rating and a $509.00 price objective on the stock. Wells Fargo & Company restated a “buy” rating on shares of Microsoft in a report on Friday, October 18th. Mizuho lifted their price objective on Microsoft from $480.00 to $510.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, December 13th. Finally, Oppenheimer downgraded Microsoft from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 8th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-seven have issued a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $512.93.

Microsoft Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:MSFT opened at $428.50 on Wednesday. The company has a market cap of $3.19 trillion, a P/E ratio of 35.35, a PEG ratio of 2.28 and a beta of 0.90. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.15, a quick ratio of 1.29 and a current ratio of 1.30. Microsoft has a one year low of $385.58 and a one year high of $468.35. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $429.54 and its 200 day simple moving average is $425.92.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, October 30th. The software giant reported $3.30 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.10 by $0.20. The business had revenue of $65.59 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $64.57 billion. Microsoft had a return on equity of 34.56% and a net margin of 35.61%. The company’s revenue was up 16.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the business posted $2.99 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Microsoft will post 12.92 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Microsoft news, EVP Christopher David Young sold 7,200 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, November 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $423.66, for a total transaction of $3,050,352.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now owns 103,366 shares in the company, valued at approximately $43,792,039.56. The trade was a 6.51 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CMO Takeshi Numoto sold 2,500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, December 9th. The stock was sold at an average price of $447.41, for a total value of $1,118,525.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief marketing officer now directly owns 49,352 shares in the company, valued at $22,080,578.32. This represents a 4.82 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders sold 41,200 shares of company stock worth $17,383,892. 0.03% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Trading of Microsoft

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the company. International Assets Investment Management LLC raised its position in shares of Microsoft by 48,526.1% during the third quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 38,501,645 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $16,567,258,000 after purchasing an additional 38,422,466 shares during the period. Wulff Hansen & CO. raised its position in shares of Microsoft by 47,196.6% during the second quarter. Wulff Hansen & CO. now owns 4,834,658 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $2,160,850,000 after purchasing an additional 4,824,436 shares during the period. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. raised its position in shares of Microsoft by 76.6% during the fourth quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 10,532,402 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $4,439,407,000 after purchasing an additional 4,568,539 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its position in shares of Microsoft by 2.0% during the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 165,024,812 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $70,790,682,000 after purchasing an additional 3,264,648 shares during the period. Finally, Baillie Gifford & Co. raised its position in shares of Microsoft by 46.1% during the third quarter. Baillie Gifford & Co. now owns 7,048,244 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $3,032,859,000 after purchasing an additional 2,222,483 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 71.13% of the company’s stock.

Microsoft Company Profile

Microsoft Corporation develops and supports software, services, devices and solutions worldwide. The Productivity and Business Processes segment offers office, exchange, SharePoint, Microsoft Teams, office 365 Security and Compliance, Microsoft viva, and Microsoft 365 copilot; and office consumer services, such as Microsoft 365 consumer subscriptions, Office licensed on-premises, and other office services.