Paces Ferry Wealth Advisors LLC Purchases 254 Shares of Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT)

Paces Ferry Wealth Advisors LLC grew its position in shares of Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT) by 3.1% in the 2nd quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 8,558 shares of the software giant’s stock after acquiring an additional 254 shares during the quarter. Microsoft makes up about 2.3% of Paces Ferry Wealth Advisors LLC’s holdings, making the stock its 11th biggest holding. Paces Ferry Wealth Advisors LLC’s holdings in Microsoft were worth $3,825,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of the company. Atwater Malick LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 10.3% in the 1st quarter. Atwater Malick LLC now owns 17,476 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $7,353,000 after acquiring an additional 1,639 shares during the last quarter. Firethorn Wealth Partners LLC raised its position in Microsoft by 4.3% in the 1st quarter. Firethorn Wealth Partners LLC now owns 9,169 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $3,858,000 after purchasing an additional 376 shares during the period. Asio Capital LLC lifted its stake in Microsoft by 0.6% in the first quarter. Asio Capital LLC now owns 29,812 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $12,543,000 after purchasing an additional 179 shares during the last quarter. Kathmere Capital Management LLC boosted its position in Microsoft by 27.6% during the first quarter. Kathmere Capital Management LLC now owns 19,774 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $8,319,000 after buying an additional 4,279 shares during the period. Finally, Silverleafe Capital Partners LLC grew its stake in shares of Microsoft by 3.0% during the first quarter. Silverleafe Capital Partners LLC now owns 7,157 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $3,011,000 after buying an additional 207 shares during the last quarter. 71.13% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

MSFT has been the subject of several analyst reports. JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their target price on Microsoft from $470.00 to $465.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, October 31st. UBS Group dropped their price objective on Microsoft from $510.00 to $500.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, October 31st. Citigroup decreased their target price on shares of Microsoft from $500.00 to $497.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, October 23rd. Wedbush reissued an “underperform” rating on shares of Microsoft in a research report on Friday, October 18th. Finally, Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on shares of Microsoft from $506.00 to $548.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 31st. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating and twenty-six have given a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Microsoft presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $503.03.

Microsoft Trading Down 0.5 %

Microsoft stock opened at $408.46 on Tuesday. Microsoft Co. has a 12 month low of $353.35 and a 12 month high of $468.35. The company has a market capitalization of $3.04 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 33.70, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.14 and a beta of 0.91. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $420.59 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $424.74. The company has a current ratio of 1.30, a quick ratio of 1.27 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.15.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last announced its quarterly earnings data 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 company had revenue of $65.59 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $64.57 billion. Microsoft had a net margin of 35.61% and a return on equity of 34.56%. Microsoft’s revenue for the quarter was up 16.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $2.99 EPS. As a group, equities analysts predict that Microsoft Co. will post 12.98 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Microsoft Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, December 12th. Investors of record on Thursday, November 21st will be given a $0.83 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, November 21st. This is a boost from Microsoft’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.75. This represents a $3.32 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.81%. Microsoft’s dividend payout ratio is 27.39%.

Microsoft declared that its board has authorized a share repurchase plan on Monday, September 16th that permits the company to repurchase $60.00 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization permits the software giant to reacquire up to 1.9% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are typically an indication that the company’s board believes its shares are undervalued.

Insider Buying and Selling at Microsoft

In other news, CEO Satya Nadella sold 14,398 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, August 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $417.41, for a total transaction of $6,009,869.18. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 786,933 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $328,473,703.53. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. In other Microsoft news, insider Bradford L. Smith sold 40,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, September 9th. The shares were sold at an average price of $402.59, for a total transaction of $16,103,600.00. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 544,847 shares in the company, valued at approximately $219,349,953.73. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Satya Nadella sold 14,398 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, August 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $417.41, for a total value of $6,009,869.18. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 786,933 shares in the company, valued at $328,473,703.53. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 190,629 shares of company stock worth $77,916,485. Insiders own 0.03% of the company’s stock.

Microsoft 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.