WealthBridge Investment Counsel Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT – Get Rating) by 11.0% during the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 13,268 shares of the software giant's stock after buying an additional 1,320 shares during the period. WealthBridge Investment Counsel Inc.'s holdings in Microsoft were worth $3,408,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.
Several other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the business. University of Texas Texas AM Investment Managment Co. raised its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 1,316.7% in the first quarter. University of Texas Texas AM Investment Managment Co. now owns 85 shares of the software giant's stock valued at $26,000 after purchasing an additional 79 shares during the last quarter. Monumental Financial Group Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Microsoft in the first quarter valued at about $28,000. Tobam raised its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 15,400.0% in the first quarter. Tobam now owns 155 shares of the software giant's stock valued at $48,000 after purchasing an additional 154 shares during the last quarter. Artemis Wealth Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Microsoft in the first quarter valued at about $68,000. Finally, Newfound Research LLC raised its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 25.4% in the second quarter. Newfound Research LLC now owns 296 shares of the software giant's stock valued at $76,000 after purchasing an additional 60 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 69.29% of the company's stock.
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Analyst Ratings Changes
Several brokerages have recently commented on MSFT. Guggenheim began coverage on shares of Microsoft in a report on Friday, August 12th. They issued a "neutral" rating and a $292.00 target price for the company. Morgan Stanley reduced their price target on shares of Microsoft from $325.00 to $307.00 and set an "overweight" rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday. KeyCorp reduced their price target on shares of Microsoft from $373.00 to $330.00 and set an "overweight" rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, July 7th. Oppenheimer reduced their price target on shares of Microsoft from $275.00 to $265.00 in a research report on Wednesday. Finally, Evercore ISI reduced their price target on shares of Microsoft from $330.00 to $300.00 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirty have given a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average price target of $303.05.
Insider Activity at Microsoft
In other Microsoft news, CMO Christopher C. Capossela sold 5,000 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, September 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $266.25, for a total transaction of $1,331,250.00. Following the transaction, the chief marketing officer now directly owns 109,837 shares of the company's stock, valued at $29,244,101.25. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at
this hyperlink. 0.05% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.
Microsoft Trading Up 4.0 %
Shares of MSFT opened at $235.87 on Friday. The firm's 50 day simple moving average is $247.40 and its 200 day simple moving average is $261.60. The company has a market capitalization of $1.76 trillion, a P/E ratio of 25.42, a P/E/G ratio of 2.13 and a beta of 0.97. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.28, a current ratio of 1.78 and a quick ratio of 1.75. Microsoft Co. has a 1-year low of $219.13 and a 1-year high of $349.67.
Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT – Get Rating) last announced its earnings results on Tuesday, October 25th. The software giant reported $2.35 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $2.30 by $0.05. The business had revenue of $50.12 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $49.70 billion. Microsoft had a net margin of 34.37% and a return on equity of 42.77%. Microsoft's quarterly revenue was up 10.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm posted $2.27 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts forecast that Microsoft Co. will post 9.72 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.
Microsoft Increases Dividend
The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, December 8th. Investors of record on Thursday, November 17th will be paid a $0.68 dividend. This is an increase from Microsoft's previous quarterly dividend of $0.62. This represents a $2.72 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.15%. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, November 16th. Microsoft's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 26.72%.
About Microsoft
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Microsoft Corporation develops, licenses, and supports software, services, devices, and solutions worldwide. The company operates in three segments: Productivity and Business Processes, Intelligent Cloud, and More Personal Computing. The Productivity and Business Processes segment offers Office, Exchange, SharePoint, Microsoft Teams, Office 365 Security and Compliance, Microsoft Viva, and Skype for Business; Skype, Outlook.com, OneDrive, and LinkedIn; and Dynamics 365, a set of cloud-based and on-premises business solutions for organizations and enterprise divisions.
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