Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) Receives Neutral Rating from Guggenheim

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT)‘s stock had its “neutral” rating reaffirmed by equities researchers at Guggenheim in a research note issued on Friday,Benzinga reports.

A number of other research firms also recently issued reports on MSFT. Oppenheimer downgraded shares of Microsoft from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 8th. TD Cowen cut their price objective on Microsoft from $495.00 to $475.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, October 31st. StockNews.com raised Microsoft from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday. Sanford C. Bernstein reduced their price target on shares of Microsoft from $501.00 to $500.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, October 25th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $500.00 price objective on shares of Microsoft in a report on Tuesday, November 5th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-seven have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $512.66.

Microsoft Price Performance

Shares of MSFT traded down $0.94 during mid-day trading on Friday, reaching $445.77. 4,119,856 shares of the stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 18,617,836. The company has a market cap of $3.31 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 36.74, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.40 and a beta of 0.90. Microsoft has a 1 year low of $385.58 and a 1 year high of $468.35. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $430.47 and a 200 day moving average price of $425.69. The company has a current ratio of 1.30, a quick ratio of 1.29 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.15.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, October 30th. The software giant reported $3.30 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.10 by $0.20. The firm had revenue of $65.59 billion during 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 for the quarter was up 16.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $2.99 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts predict that Microsoft will post 12.9 earnings per share for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Microsoft news, EVP Judson Althoff sold 25,000 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction on Friday, November 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $417.00, for a total value of $10,425,000.00. Following the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 117,294 shares in the company, valued at approximately $48,911,598. The trade was a 17.57 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible 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 transaction of $1,118,525.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief marketing officer now owns 49,352 shares in the company, valued at approximately $22,080,578.32. The trade was a 4.82 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 41,200 shares of company stock worth $17,383,892 over the last three months. 0.03% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Microsoft

Several institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in MSFT. Net Worth Advisory Group bought a new position in Microsoft during the third quarter valued at $2,645,000. Oak Ridge Investments LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 7.6% in the 3rd quarter. Oak Ridge Investments LLC now owns 263,534 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $113,399,000 after acquiring an additional 18,544 shares during the last quarter. BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp increased its stake in Microsoft by 1.6% during the second quarter. BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp now owns 1,975,200 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $882,816,000 after acquiring an additional 31,401 shares during the last quarter. Jacobs & Co. CA raised its position in Microsoft by 0.9% during the third quarter. Jacobs & Co. CA now owns 96,021 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $41,318,000 after purchasing an additional 880 shares during the period. Finally, Focus Financial Network Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Microsoft by 2.0% in the 3rd quarter. Focus Financial Network Inc. now owns 76,296 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $32,830,000 after purchasing an additional 1,489 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 71.13% of the company’s stock.

About Microsoft

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.