Flower City Capital Lowers Stock Holdings in Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT)

Posted by Defense World Staff on Mar 24th, 2023

Flower City Capital lessened its stake in Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT – Get Rating) by 9.1% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent filing with the SEC. The firm owned 1,291 shares of the software giant’s stock after selling 130 shares during the quarter. Microsoft accounts for approximately 0.4% of Flower City Capital’s portfolio, making the stock its 20th biggest position. Flower City Capital’s holdings in Microsoft were worth $310,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in the stock. Aaron Wealth Advisors LLC increased its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 35,465.9% in the first quarter. Aaron Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 20,611,140 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $66,852,000 after purchasing an additional 20,553,188 shares during the period. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in shares of Microsoft by 1.0% in the third quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 634,238,715 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $147,714,197,000 after acquiring an additional 6,129,708 shares in the last quarter. Bishop Rock Capital L.P. lifted its position in shares of Microsoft by 11,434.2% in the second quarter. Bishop Rock Capital L.P. now owns 5,460,976 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $21,263,000 after acquiring an additional 5,413,630 shares in the last quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Microsoft in the second quarter valued at $981,125,000. Finally, Swiss National Bank lifted its position in shares of Microsoft by 13.8% in the first quarter. Swiss National Bank now owns 30,893,155 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $9,524,669,000 after acquiring an additional 3,757,500 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 69.15% of the company’s stock.

Insider Transactions at Microsoft

In other news, CEO Satya Nadella sold 4,767 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $248.88, for a total value of $1,186,410.96. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 788,625 shares in the company, valued at approximately $196,272,990. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. In other news, CMO Christopher C. Capossela sold 1,000 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, February 9th. The stock was sold at an average price of $269.38, for a total value of $269,380.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief marketing officer now owns 117,362 shares in the company, valued at approximately $31,614,975.56. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Satya Nadella sold 4,767 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $248.88, for a total value of $1,186,410.96. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 788,625 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $196,272,990. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders sold 6,767 shares of company stock worth $1,728,111. 0.03% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

MSFT has been the subject of several analyst reports. BMO Capital Markets lowered Microsoft from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and dropped their target price for the company from $267.00 to $265.00 in a research note on Wednesday, January 25th. They noted that the move was a valuation call. Oppenheimer upped their target price on Microsoft from $265.00 to $280.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, February 8th. Mizuho upped their target price on Microsoft from $300.00 to $315.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, March 17th. DA Davidson upped their target price on Microsoft from $280.00 to $325.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, February 8th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada reiterated an “outperform” rating and issued a $285.00 target price on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Friday, March 17th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have given a hold rating and twenty-seven have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Microsoft currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $287.30.

Microsoft Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ MSFT opened at $277.66 on Friday. Microsoft Co. has a fifty-two week low of $213.43 and a fifty-two week high of $315.95. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $255.62 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $245.93. The company has a quick ratio of 1.89, a current ratio of 1.93 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.24. The firm has a market cap of $2.07 trillion, a PE ratio of 30.85, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.50 and a beta of 0.92.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT – Get Rating) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, January 24th. The software giant reported $2.32 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.27 by $0.05. The firm had revenue of $52.75 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $53.17 billion. Microsoft had a return on equity of 39.87% and a net margin of 33.05%. Microsoft’s quarterly revenue was up 2.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $2.48 EPS. Sell-side analysts expect that Microsoft Co. will post 9.34 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Microsoft Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, June 6th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, May 18th will be given a $0.68 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, May 17th. This represents a $2.72 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.98%. Microsoft’s payout ratio is 30.22%.

About Microsoft

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Microsoft Corp. engages in the development and support of software, services, devices, and solutions. It operates through the following business segments: Productivity and Business Processes, Intelligent Cloud, and More Personal Computing. The Productivity and Business Processes segment consists of Office Commercial (Office 365 subscriptions, the Office 365 portion of Microsoft 365 Commercial subscriptions, and Office licensed on-premises), Exchange, SharePoint, Microsoft Teams, Office 365 Security and Compliance, and Skype for Business, Office Consumer, including Microsoft 365 Consumer subscriptions, Office licensed on-premises, and other Office services, LinkedIn, including Talent Solutions, Marketing Solutions, Premium Subscriptions, Sales Solutions, and Learning Solutions, Dynamics business solutions, including Dynamics 365, comprising a set of intelligent, cloud-based applications across ERP, CRM, Customer Insights, Power Apps, and Power Automate, and on-premises ERP and CRM applications.