Gerber Kawasaki Wealth & Investment Management Buys 3,605 Shares of Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT)

Gerber Kawasaki Wealth & Investment Management boosted its position in Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT – Get Rating) by 2.9% during the third quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 127,457 shares of the software giant’s stock after purchasing an additional 3,605 shares during the period. Microsoft accounts for approximately 2.8% of Gerber Kawasaki Wealth & Investment Management’s portfolio, making the stock its 6th biggest position. Gerber Kawasaki Wealth & Investment Management’s holdings in Microsoft were worth $29,731,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other large investors have also recently bought and sold shares of MSFT. Aaron Wealth Advisors LLC boosted its position in Microsoft by 35,465.9% in the first quarter. Aaron Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 20,611,140 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $66,852,000 after buying an additional 20,553,188 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in Microsoft by 1.0% in the 3rd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 634,238,715 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $147,714,197,000 after purchasing an additional 6,129,708 shares in the last quarter. Bishop Rock Capital L.P. boosted its position in Microsoft by 11,434.2% in the 2nd quarter. Bishop Rock Capital L.P. now owns 5,460,976 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $21,263,000 after purchasing an additional 5,413,630 shares in the last quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC purchased a new stake in Microsoft in the 2nd quarter worth approximately $981,125,000. Finally, Swiss National Bank boosted its position in Microsoft by 13.8% in the 1st quarter. Swiss National Bank now owns 30,893,155 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $9,524,669,000 after purchasing an additional 3,757,500 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 69.15% of the company’s stock.

Microsoft Trading Up 2.7 %

Shares of MSFT stock opened at $260.79 on Wednesday. The business’s 50 day moving average is $249.41 and its two-hundred day moving average is $245.09. Microsoft Co. has a twelve month low of $213.43 and a twelve month high of $315.95. The company has a market capitalization of $1.94 trillion, a P/E ratio of 28.98, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.28 and a beta of 0.92. The company has a current ratio of 1.93, a quick ratio of 1.89 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.24.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT – Get Rating) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, January 24th. The software giant reported $2.32 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.27 by $0.05. Microsoft had a return on equity of 39.87% and a net margin of 33.05%. The firm had revenue of $52.75 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $53.17 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $2.48 earnings per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 2.0% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities analysts forecast that Microsoft Co. will post 9.34 EPS for the current year.

Microsoft Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, June 6th. Investors of record on Thursday, May 18th will be paid a $0.68 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, May 17th. This represents a $2.72 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.04%. Microsoft’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 30.22%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

MSFT has been the topic of several recent research reports. Fundamental Research lowered their price objective on Microsoft from $269.73 to $259.47 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, February 2nd. Barclays reduced their target price on Microsoft from $296.00 to $280.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, January 10th. DA Davidson upped their target price on Microsoft from $280.00 to $325.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, February 8th. Stifel Nicolaus reduced their target price on Microsoft from $290.00 to $275.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, January 25th. Finally, Raymond James reduced their target price on Microsoft from $280.00 to $270.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, January 25th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have assigned a hold rating and twenty-seven have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $285.58.

Insider Activity at Microsoft

In related news, CEO Satya Nadella sold 4,767 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $248.88, for a total value of $1,186,410.96. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 788,625 shares in the company, valued at $196,272,990. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. In related news, CEO Satya Nadella sold 4,767 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $248.88, for a total value of $1,186,410.96. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 788,625 shares in the company, valued at $196,272,990. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CMO Christopher C. Capossela sold 1,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, February 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $272.32, for a total value of $272,320.00. Following the sale, the chief marketing officer now owns 116,362 shares in the company, valued at $31,687,699.84. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 6,767 shares of company stock worth $1,728,111 over the last three months. 0.03% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Microsoft Company Profile

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Microsoft Corp. engages in the development and support of software, services, devices, and solutions. It operates through the following business segments: Productivity and Business Processes, Intelligent Cloud, and More Personal Computing. The Productivity and Business Processes segment consists of Office Commercial (Office 365 subscriptions, the Office 365 portion of Microsoft 365 Commercial subscriptions, and Office licensed on-premises), Exchange, SharePoint, Microsoft Teams, Office 365 Security and Compliance, and Skype for Business, Office Consumer, including Microsoft 365 Consumer subscriptions, Office licensed on-premises, and other Office services, LinkedIn, including Talent Solutions, Marketing Solutions, Premium Subscriptions, Sales Solutions, and Learning Solutions, Dynamics business solutions, including Dynamics 365, comprising a set of intelligent, cloud-based applications across ERP, CRM, Customer Insights, Power Apps, and Power Automate, and on-premises ERP and CRM applications.