Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT) Stock Holdings Lifted by Lansing Street Advisors

Lansing Street Advisors increased its stake in Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT) by 3.8% during the third quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The fund owned 6,776 shares of the software giant’s stock after buying an additional 249 shares during the period. Microsoft makes up approximately 1.1% of Lansing Street Advisors’ holdings, making the stock its 26th biggest position. Lansing Street Advisors’ holdings in Microsoft were worth $2,916,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of the company. Christopher J. Hasenberg Inc grew its position in Microsoft by 169.2% during the 2nd quarter. Christopher J. Hasenberg Inc now owns 70 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $31,000 after purchasing an additional 44 shares in the last quarter. Quarry LP acquired a new position in shares of Microsoft in the 2nd quarter valued at about $45,000. Innealta Capital LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Microsoft in the second quarter worth approximately $75,000. Carolina Wealth Advisors LLC grew its position in Microsoft by 10.1% during the third quarter. Carolina Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 338 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $145,000 after purchasing an additional 31 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Bbjs Financial Advisors LLC lifted its position in Microsoft by 241.4% in the 2nd quarter. Bbjs Financial Advisors LLC now owns 379 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $169,000 after buying an additional 268 shares in the last quarter. 71.13% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research firms have recently weighed in on MSFT. Stifel Nicolaus upped their price target on shares of Microsoft from $475.00 to $515.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, December 18th. DA Davidson downgraded Microsoft from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $475.00 price target for the company. in a research note on Monday, September 23rd. UBS Group increased their price objective on Microsoft from $500.00 to $525.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, December 18th. TD Cowen decreased their target price on shares of Microsoft from $495.00 to $475.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, October 31st. Finally, BMO Capital Markets cut their price target on shares of Microsoft from $500.00 to $495.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, October 31st. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twenty-seven have given a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Microsoft presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $509.90.

Microsoft Stock Up 1.1 %

MSFT stock opened at $423.35 on Friday. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $428.71 and its 200 day simple moving average is $428.38. The company has a quick ratio of 1.29, a current ratio of 1.30 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.15. The company has a market cap of $3.15 trillion, a PE ratio of 34.93, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.37 and a beta of 0.90. Microsoft Co. has a twelve month low of $366.50 and a twelve month high of $468.35.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last released its quarterly earnings data 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 business had revenue of $65.59 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $64.57 billion. Microsoft had a return on equity of 34.56% and a net margin of 35.61%. Microsoft’s quarterly revenue was up 16.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $2.99 earnings per share. On average, research analysts anticipate that Microsoft Co. will post 12.93 earnings per share for the current year.

Microsoft Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 13th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, February 20th will be paid a $0.83 dividend. This represents a $3.32 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.78%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, February 20th. Microsoft’s dividend payout ratio is 27.39%.

Microsoft announced that its board has authorized a stock buyback program on Monday, September 16th that permits the company to repurchase $60.00 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization permits the software giant to buy up to 1.9% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are often an indication that the company’s board believes its shares are undervalued.

Insider Activity

In other Microsoft news, EVP Christopher David Young sold 7,200 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, November 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $423.66, for a total transaction of $3,050,352.00. Following the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 103,366 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $43,792,039.56. The trade was a 6.51 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CMO Takeshi Numoto sold 1,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $414.72, for a total value of $414,720.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief marketing officer now directly owns 57,511 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $23,850,961.92. The trade was a 1.71 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 41,200 shares of company stock worth $17,383,892. Corporate insiders own 0.03% 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.