Diamond Hill Capital Management LLC Investment Advisor Takes Position in Salesforce Inc. $CRM

Diamond Hill Capital Management LLC Investment Advisor acquired a new position in Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) in the second quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The institutional investor acquired 1,405,920 shares of the CRM provider’s stock, valued at approximately $220,251,000. Salesforce comprises 1.8% of Diamond Hill Capital Management LLC Investment Advisor’s holdings, making the stock its 15th biggest holding.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Commonwealth Retirement Investments LLC bought a new position in Salesforce in the 4th quarter worth approximately $25,000. Gilpin Wealth Management LLC bought a new stake in shares of Salesforce during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $26,000. Birchwood Financial Partners Inc. bought a new stake in shares of Salesforce during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $28,000. Swiss RE Ltd. purchased a new position in shares of Salesforce in the fourth quarter worth $28,000. Finally, Dogwood Wealth Management LLC boosted its position in shares of Salesforce by 285.7% during the fourth quarter. Dogwood Wealth Management LLC now owns 108 shares of the CRM provider’s stock worth $29,000 after acquiring an additional 80 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 80.43% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages have issued reports on CRM. HSBC lifted their price target on shares of Salesforce from $350.00 to $356.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, May 29th. Cantor Fitzgerald restated an “overweight” rating and set a $250.00 price objective on shares of Salesforce in a research report on Thursday, May 28th. KeyCorp cut Salesforce from an “overweight” rating to a “sector weight” rating in a report on Wednesday, July 8th. UBS Group boosted their target price on Salesforce from $185.00 to $210.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, August 12th. Finally, Truist Financial lowered Salesforce from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 1st. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty-five have issued a Buy rating, seventeen have assigned a Hold rating and three have given a Sell rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $249.05.

Salesforce Stock Down 0.2%

Shares of NYSE:CRM opened at $195.86 on Monday. The company has a market cap of $160.41 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.67, a PEG ratio of 1.06 and a beta of 1.16. Salesforce Inc. has a 12 month low of $146.32 and a 12 month high of $269.11. The company has a current ratio of 0.79, a quick ratio of 0.79 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.15. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $171.41 and a 200 day moving average price of $181.95.

Salesforce (NYSE:CRM) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, May 27th. The CRM provider reported $3.88 earnings per share for the quarter, topping 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 company had revenue of $11.13 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $11.05 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $2.58 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 13.3% on a year-over-year basis. Salesforce has set its FY 2027 guidance at 14.060-14.120 EPS and its Q2 2027 guidance at 3.250-3.270 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts predict that Salesforce Inc. will post 10.27 earnings per share for the current year.

Salesforce Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, July 2nd. Investors of record on Thursday, June 11th were issued a dividend of $0.44 per share. This represents a $1.76 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.9%. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, June 11th. Salesforce’s dividend payout ratio is presently 20.37%.

Key Stories Impacting Salesforce

Here are the key news stories impacting Salesforce this week:

• Positive Sentiment: JPMorgan resumed coverage with an Overweight rating and a $250 price target, citing potential acceleration in Salesforce’s core business during the second half of the year. The target implies more than 24% upside from recent levels. JPMorgan bullish Salesforce coverage
• Positive Sentiment: Monness Crespi & Hardt raised its Salesforce price target to $222 from $200 and maintained a Buy rating. UBS and Wells Fargo also reportedly forecast strong appreciation, reinforcing improving sell-side sentiment. Monness Crespi Salesforce price target
• Positive Sentiment: Salesforce’s Agentforce platform is gaining traction, giving the company a way to use its large CRM customer base to compete with Microsoft and Oracle in enterprise “agentic” AI. Salesforce agentic AI analysis
• Positive Sentiment: A Seeking Alpha analysis argues that Salesforce’s $27.1 billion share-repurchase program, equivalent to an estimated 23% net buyback yield, could support earnings-per-share growth. The stock also appears inexpensive at roughly 14 times forward earnings, although buybacks have increased debt. Salesforce buyback analysis
• Neutral Sentiment: Salesforce has recently posted strong momentum, with reports noting three consecutive weeks of gains and substantial one-month appreciation. That run may be encouraging investors, but it also raises the possibility of profit-taking.
• Negative Sentiment: Parnassus Investments indicated that Salesforce has lost favor as AI opportunities shift toward competing or substitute technologies. Other commentary likewise warns that alternative software and AI-native tools threaten Salesforce’s traditional CRM franchise. Salesforce AI competition concerns

About Salesforce

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.