First Manhattan CO. LLC. Boosts Stake in Salesforce Inc. $CRM

First Manhattan CO. LLC. boosted its position in shares of Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) by 19.6% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 2,667,418 shares of the CRM provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 437,277 shares during the quarter. Salesforce accounts for 1.9% of First Manhattan CO. LLC.’s portfolio, making the stock its 11th biggest holding. First Manhattan CO. LLC.’s holdings in Salesforce were worth $707,670,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Byrne Asset Management LLC increased its position in Salesforce by 1.0% in the fourth quarter. Byrne Asset Management LLC now owns 4,331 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $1,147,000 after buying an additional 43 shares in the last quarter. Mathes Company Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Salesforce by 0.4% in the 3rd quarter. Mathes Company Inc. now owns 12,558 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $2,976,000 after purchasing an additional 45 shares during the last quarter. Fred Alger Management LLC lifted its stake in shares of Salesforce by 0.3% in the 3rd quarter. Fred Alger Management LLC now owns 14,943 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $3,548,000 after purchasing an additional 45 shares during the last quarter. Fulcrum Asset Management LLP lifted its stake in shares of Salesforce by 1.7% in the 3rd quarter. Fulcrum Asset Management LLP now owns 2,774 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $657,000 after purchasing an additional 46 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Pine Haven Investment Counsel Inc lifted its stake in shares of Salesforce by 1.5% in the 4th quarter. Pine Haven Investment Counsel Inc now owns 3,152 shares of the CRM provider’s stock valued at $835,000 after purchasing an additional 46 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Key Headlines Impacting Salesforce

Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Salesforce announced a $3.6 billion acquisition of Fin, a customer AI agent platform, reinforcing its push into agentic AI and potentially expanding its automation and customer-service capabilities. Salesforce to acquire customer AI agent platform Fin for $3.6B
• Positive Sentiment: Some analysts remain constructive, with reaffirmed Buy ratings and targets well above the current share price, suggesting potential upside if Salesforce’s AI strategy and cash generation continue to improve. Analyst rating updates
• Neutral Sentiment: UBS reiterated a Neutral rating, reflecting a wait-and-see stance as investors assess whether Salesforce can convert its AI investments into faster growth. UBS sticks neutral
• Neutral Sentiment: Reports highlighting strong cash flow, rising margins, and a large buyback plan support the view that Salesforce still has financial flexibility to reward shareholders while investing in growth. CRM’s Record Cash Generation Support Robust Shareholder Returns
• Negative Sentiment: Multiple articles raised concerns that Salesforce’s acquisition-heavy strategy may not be translating into sustained growth reacceleration, with some analysts cutting fair value estimates and questioning AI monetization. Salesforce (CRM) Stock Sees Fair Value Cut As Analysts Question AI Growth Path
• Negative Sentiment: Commentary also pointed to “unit economic” concerns and recent share-price weakness, suggesting investors are worried the market is still paying closer attention to execution risk than to the long-term AI opportunity. Salesforce: Putting The Spotlight On The Unit Economic Concerns

Salesforce Stock Performance

Shares of CRM stock opened at $154.88 on Thursday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.79, a current ratio of 0.79 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.15. Salesforce Inc. has a 52-week low of $154.23 and a 52-week high of $276.80. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of $178.54 and a 200-day simple moving average of $205.28. The stock has a market cap of $126.85 billion, a PE ratio of 17.93, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.01 and a beta of 1.16.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, May 27th. The CRM provider reported $3.88 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.13 by $0.75. Salesforce had a return on equity of 18.72% and a net margin of 18.73%.The firm had revenue of $11.13 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $11.05 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $2.58 EPS. Salesforce’s revenue for the quarter was up 13.3% compared to the same quarter last year. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 14.060-14.120 EPS and its Q2 2027 guidance at 3.250-3.270 EPS. On average, equities analysts expect that Salesforce Inc. will post 10.29 EPS for the current year.

Salesforce announced that its board has approved a stock buyback program on Monday, March 16th that permits the company to buyback $25.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization permits the CRM provider to repurchase up to 14.1% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are generally an indication that the company’s management believes its shares are undervalued.

Salesforce Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, July 2nd. Investors of record on Thursday, June 11th will be paid a $0.44 dividend. This represents a $1.76 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.1%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, June 11th. Salesforce’s payout ratio is currently 20.37%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages recently issued reports on CRM. KeyCorp decreased their price target on Salesforce from $300.00 to $290.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, May 28th. TD Cowen reiterated a “buy” rating on shares of Salesforce in a report on Friday, June 12th. Wall Street Zen upgraded Salesforce from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Saturday, June 6th. Sanford C. Bernstein lowered their price objective on Salesforce from $194.00 to $173.00 and set an “underperform” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, May 28th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group reissued a “buy” rating on shares of Salesforce in a research report on Monday. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-six have given a Buy rating, ten have given a Hold rating and two have assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $259.26.

Salesforce Company Profile

Salesforce, founded in 1999 and headquartered in San Francisco, is a global provider of cloud-based software focused on customer relationship management (CRM) and enterprise applications. The company popularized the software-as-a-service (SaaS) model for CRM and has built a broad portfolio of products designed to help organizations manage sales, service, marketing, commerce and analytics through a unified, cloud-first platform.

Core offerings include Sales Cloud for sales automation, Service Cloud for customer support, Marketing Cloud for digital marketing and engagement, and Commerce Cloud for e-commerce.