Houlihan Financial Resource Group Ltd. Buys Shares of 17,362 Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT)

Houlihan Financial Resource Group Ltd. bought a new stake in shares of Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT) during the third quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund bought 17,362 shares of the software giant’s stock, valued at approximately $7,471,000. Microsoft makes up about 3.1% of Houlihan Financial Resource Group Ltd.’s holdings, making the stock its 6th largest holding.

A number of other large investors have also recently bought and sold shares of MSFT. International Assets Investment Management LLC grew its holdings in Microsoft by 48,526.1% during the 3rd quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 38,501,645 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $16,567,258,000 after buying an additional 38,422,466 shares during the last quarter. Wulff Hansen & CO. boosted its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 47,196.6% during the second quarter. Wulff Hansen & CO. now owns 4,834,658 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $2,160,850,000 after purchasing an additional 4,824,436 shares during the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. boosted its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 67.5% during the third quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 5,963,863 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $2,566,250,000 after purchasing an additional 2,404,348 shares during the last quarter. AustralianSuper Pty Ltd boosted its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 56.9% during the third quarter. AustralianSuper Pty Ltd now owns 5,344,566 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $2,299,767,000 after purchasing an additional 1,938,304 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Strategic Financial Concepts LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 31,648.5% during the second quarter. Strategic Financial Concepts LLC now owns 1,871,892 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $8,366,000 after purchasing an additional 1,865,996 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 71.13% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Microsoft news, EVP Judson Althoff sold 25,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, November 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $417.00, for a total transaction of $10,425,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 117,294 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $48,911,598. This trade represents a 17.57 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CMO Takeshi Numoto sold 1,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, November 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $414.72, for a total value of $414,720.00. Following 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. Insiders sold 41,200 shares of company stock valued at $17,383,892 in the last three months. 0.03% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

MSFT has been the subject of a number of research reports. BMO Capital Markets lowered their price target on Microsoft from $500.00 to $495.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, October 31st. StockNews.com downgraded Microsoft from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Tuesday. UBS Group upped their target price on Microsoft from $500.00 to $525.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 18th. Wedbush reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $550.00 target price on shares of Microsoft in a research report on Tuesday, November 19th. Finally, Oppenheimer downgraded Microsoft from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 8th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twenty-seven have given a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $511.62.

Microsoft Stock Down 0.4 %

Shares of Microsoft stock opened at $417.19 on Tuesday. Microsoft Co. has a twelve month low of $384.81 and a twelve month high of $468.35. The stock has a market capitalization of $3.10 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 34.42, a PEG ratio of 2.37 and a beta of 0.90. The business’s 50 day simple moving average is $429.00 and its 200-day simple moving average is $426.98. The company has a current ratio of 1.30, a quick ratio of 1.29 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.15.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, October 30th. The software giant reported $3.30 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.10 by $0.20. Microsoft had a return on equity of 34.56% and a net margin of 35.61%. The business had revenue of $65.59 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $64.57 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $2.99 EPS. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 16.0% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities research analysts forecast that Microsoft Co. will post 12.93 earnings per share for the current year.

Microsoft declared that its Board of Directors has initiated a share repurchase plan on Monday, September 16th that permits the company to buyback $60.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization permits the software giant to purchase up to 1.9% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback plans are generally an indication that the company’s board believes its stock is undervalued.

Microsoft Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 13th. Investors of record on Thursday, February 20th will be issued a $0.83 dividend. This represents a $3.32 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.80%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, February 20th. Microsoft’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 27.39%.

Microsoft Company 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.