Paragon Wealth Strategies LLC Has $989,000 Holdings in Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT)

Posted by Defense World Staff on Apr 29th, 2023

Paragon Wealth Strategies LLC lowered its position in shares of Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT – Get Rating) by 3.9% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 4,124 shares of the software giant’s stock after selling 169 shares during the quarter. Microsoft accounts for approximately 1.2% of Paragon Wealth Strategies LLC’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 8th largest position. Paragon Wealth Strategies LLC’s holdings in Microsoft were worth $989,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other large investors have also bought and sold shares of the company. Aaron Wealth Advisors LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 35,465.9% during 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 last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 1.0% during 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 purchasing an additional 6,129,708 shares during the last quarter. Swiss National Bank lifted its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 13.8% during 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 purchasing an additional 3,757,500 shares during the last quarter. Cottage Street Advisors LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 17,734.7% during the fourth quarter. Cottage Street Advisors LLC now owns 3,763,300 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $1,351,000 after purchasing an additional 3,742,199 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Mitsubishi UFJ Kokusai Asset Management Co. Ltd. lifted its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 73.8% during the third quarter. Mitsubishi UFJ Kokusai Asset Management Co. Ltd. now owns 8,172,257 shares of the software giant’s stock valued at $1,903,319,000 after purchasing an additional 3,471,095 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 69.15% of the company’s stock.

Microsoft Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:MSFT opened at $307.26 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 1.91, a quick ratio of 1.89 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.22. The firm has a market capitalization of $2.28 trillion, a PE ratio of 33.29, a PEG ratio of 2.82 and a beta of 0.93. Microsoft Co. has a 1-year low of $213.43 and a 1-year high of $308.93. The business’s 50 day moving average is $273.53 and its 200-day moving average is $253.36.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT – Get Rating) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, April 25th. The software giant reported $2.45 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.22 by $0.23. The business had revenue of $52.86 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $51.01 billion. Microsoft had a return on equity of 38.98% and a net margin of 33.25%. Microsoft’s revenue was up 7.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $2.22 EPS. Sell-side analysts predict that Microsoft Co. will post 9.41 earnings per share for the current year.

Microsoft Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, June 6th. Investors of record on Thursday, May 18th will be given a dividend of $0.68 per share. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, May 17th. This represents a $2.72 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.89%. Microsoft’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 29.47%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CMO Christopher C. Capossela sold 1,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $272.32, for a total transaction of $272,320.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief marketing officer now owns 116,362 shares in the company, valued at approximately $31,687,699.84. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. In other Microsoft news, CMO Christopher C. Capossela sold 1,000 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction on Monday, February 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $272.32, for a total value of $272,320.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief marketing officer now owns 116,362 shares in the company, valued at approximately $31,687,699.84. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CEO Satya Nadella sold 4,767 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction on Tuesday, February 28th. The shares were 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. Insiders sold 6,767 shares of company stock worth $1,728,111 in the last 90 days. 0.03% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

MSFT has been the subject of several analyst reports. Guggenheim upped their target price on Microsoft from $212.00 to $232.00 and gave the company a “sell” rating in a report on Wednesday. Oppenheimer increased their price objective on Microsoft from $310.00 to $330.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday. Morgan Stanley increased their price objective on Microsoft from $307.00 to $335.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday. Moffett Nathanson increased their price objective on Microsoft from $263.00 to $306.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research note on Wednesday. Finally, StockNews.com raised Microsoft from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have issued a hold rating and thirty-three have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $322.88.

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.