BlackRock Fund Advisors recently announced the acquisition of new stake in Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT). The institutional investor has increased its shareholding in the Technology company by 0.59% to 342.96 million shares with purchase of 2.01 million shares. This fresh investment now brings its stake to 4.61% valued currently at $129.95 billion. In addition, Fidelity Management & Research Co raised its holdings by 4.57 million to 188.18 million shares. And Geode Capital Management LLC has lifted its position by 2.09% or 3.09 million shares – to 151.22 million shares.
With over 18.71 million Microsoft Corporation (MSFT) shares trading Friday and a closing price of $376.04 on the day, the dollar volume was approximately $7.03 billion. The shares have shown a positive half year performance of 10.42% and its price on 12/29/23 gained nearly 0.20%. Currently, there are 7.43B common shares owned by the public and among those 7.32B shares have been available to trade.
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An analysis of what Wall Street brokers have to say about the expected price targets for this stock gives us this picture: 53 analysts who have offered their price forecasts for MSFT have a consensus price objective of $418.05. The analysts have set the share’s price value over the next 12 months at a high of $600.00 and a low of $350.00. The average price target is 10.05% above its recent price level and a downside to the estimated low will see the stock lose -7.44% over that period. But an upside of 37.33% will see the stock hit the forecast high price target while median target price for the stock is $415.00.
Insiders at the company have transacted a total of 87 times over the past 12 months, according to data filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). 30 of these insider trades were purchases, accounting for 395,133 shares. Insider sales of the common stock occurred on 57 occasions, with total insider shares sold totaling 388,415 shares.
The top 3 mutual fund holders in Microsoft Corporation are Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF, Vanguard 500 Index Fund, and Fidelity 500 Index Fund. Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF owns 232.88 million shares of the company’s stock, all valued at over $88.24 billion. The company bought an additional 0.32 million shares recently to bring their total holdings to about 3.13% of the shares outstanding. Vanguard 500 Index Fund bought 0.85 million shares to see its total holdings expand to 179.42 million shares valued at over $67.98 billion and representing 2.41% of the shares outstanding. Fidelity 500 Index Fund bought 0.69 million shares to bring its total holdings to over 86.03 million shares at a value of $32.6 billion. Fidelity 500 Index Fund now owns shares totaling to 1.16% of the shares outstanding.
Shares of Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) opened at $376.00, up $0.72 from a prior closing price of $375.28. However, the script later moved the day high at 377.16, up 0.20%. The company’s stock has a 5-day price change of 0.67% and 19.09% over the past three months. MSFT shares are trading 56.80% year to date (YTD), with the 12-month market performance up to 60.34% higher. It has a 12-month low price of $219.35 and touched a high of $384.30 over the same period. MSFT has an average intraday trading volume of 25.91 million shares. The stock is trading above its simple moving averages at the SMA20, SMA50, and SMA200, as the current price level is off by 0.89%, 3.69%, and 14.13% respectively.
Institutional ownership of Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) shares accounts for 72.18% of the company’s 7.43B shares outstanding. Mutual fund holders own 41.49%, while other institutional holders and individual stakeholders account for 6.34% and 30.93% respectively.
It has a market capitalization of $2794.83B and a beta (3y monthly) value of 0.87. The stock’s trailing 12-month PE ratio is 36.42, while the earnings-per-share (ttm) stands at $10.33. The company has a PEG of 2.36 and a Quick Ratio of 1.64 with the debt-to-equity ratio at 0.48. Price movements for the stock have been influenced by the stock’s volatility, which stands at 0.76% over the week and 1.38% over the month.
Analysts forecast that Microsoft Corporation (MSFT) will achieve an EPS of $2.78 for the current quarter, $2.64 for the next quarter and $12.95 for 2025. The lowest estimate earnings-per-share for the quarter is $2.72 while analysts give the company a high EPS estimate of $3.32. Comparatively, EPS for the current quarter was $2.32 a year ago. Earnings per share for the fiscal year are expected to increase by 14.41%, and 15.26% over the next financial year. EPS should shrink at an annualized rate of 15.42% over the next five years, compared to 35.37% over the past 5-year period.
If you are looking to buy this stock, then you may note that the average analyst recommendation by 53 brokerage firm advisors rate Microsoft Corporation (MSFT) as a “Strong Buy” at a consensus score of 1.30. Specifically, 42 Wall Street analysts polled rate the stock as a buy, while 5 of the 53 advise that investors “hold,” and 0 rated it as a “Sell.”
