Kelman Lazarov Inc. Increases Position in Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT)

Kelman Lazarov Inc. increased its stake in shares of Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT – Get Rating) by 2.1% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 2,946 shares of the software giant’s stock after buying an additional 61 shares during the quarter. Kelman Lazarov Inc.’s holdings in Microsoft were worth $707,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Aaron Wealth Advisors LLC lifted its stake in Microsoft by 35,465.9% in the 1st quarter. Aaron Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 20,611,140 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $66,852,000 after purchasing an additional 20,553,188 shares in the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its holdings in Microsoft by 1.0% in the 3rd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 634,238,715 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $147,714,197,000 after purchasing an additional 6,129,708 shares during the last quarter. Swiss National Bank grew its stake in shares of Microsoft by 13.8% in the first quarter. Swiss National Bank now owns 30,893,155 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $9,524,669,000 after acquiring an additional 3,757,500 shares in the last quarter. Cottage Street Advisors LLC grew its stake in shares of Microsoft by 17,734.7% in the fourth quarter. Cottage Street Advisors LLC now owns 3,763,300 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $1,351,000 after acquiring an additional 3,742,199 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Mitsubishi UFJ Kokusai Asset Management Co. Ltd. lifted its position in shares of Microsoft by 73.8% during the 3rd quarter. Mitsubishi UFJ Kokusai Asset Management Co. Ltd. now owns 8,172,257 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $1,903,319,000 after purchasing an additional 3,471,095 shares during the last quarter. 69.15% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research firms have recently issued reports on MSFT. BMO Capital Markets raised shares of Microsoft from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and lifted their price objective for the stock from $325.00 to $347.00 in a research report on Wednesday, April 26th. Piper Sandler boosted their price target on shares of Microsoft from $290.00 to $348.00 in a research note on Wednesday, April 26th. Wedbush upped their target price on shares of Microsoft from $325.00 to $340.00 in a research report on Thursday, May 11th. Morgan Stanley increased their price target on shares of Microsoft from $307.00 to $335.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, April 26th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada upped their price objective on shares of Microsoft from $285.00 to $350.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, April 26th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have given a hold rating and thirty-two have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Microsoft has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $323.28.

Microsoft Price Performance

Microsoft stock opened at $318.34 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $2.37 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 34.49, a PEG ratio of 2.79 and a beta of 0.93. Microsoft Co. has a 52-week low of $213.43 and a 52-week high of $319.04. The stock’s 50 day moving average price is $290.86 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $261.15. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.22, a quick ratio of 1.88 and a current ratio of 1.91.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT – Get Rating) last issued its earnings results on Tuesday, April 25th. The software giant reported $2.45 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.22 by $0.23. The company had revenue of $52.86 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $51.01 billion. Microsoft had a return on equity of 38.98% and a net margin of 33.25%. Microsoft’s quarterly revenue was up 7.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the business earned $2.22 EPS. On average, equities analysts predict that Microsoft Co. will post 9.66 earnings per share for the current year.

Microsoft Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, June 8th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, May 18th will be paid a dividend of $0.68 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, May 17th. This represents a $2.72 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.85%. Microsoft’s payout ratio is 29.47%.

Insider Transactions at Microsoft

In other news, CMO Christopher C. Capossela sold 5,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, May 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $316.87, for a total transaction of $1,584,350.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief marketing officer now owns 89,328 shares in the company, valued at approximately $28,305,363.36. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. In other Microsoft news, CMO Christopher C. Capossela sold 5,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, May 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $316.87, for a total value of $1,584,350.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief marketing officer now owns 89,328 shares in the company, valued at approximately $28,305,363.36. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CEO Satya Nadella sold 4,767 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated 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 completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 788,625 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $196,272,990. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders sold 54,848 shares of company stock worth $16,635,227. 0.03% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

About Microsoft

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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.