Palo Alto Wealth Advisors LLC Sells 4,703 Shares of Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT)

Palo Alto Wealth Advisors LLC reduced its holdings in Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT - Free Report) by 20.9% during the third quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 17,747 shares of the software giant's stock after selling 4,703 shares during the quarter. Microsoft accounts for about 3.1% of Palo Alto Wealth Advisors LLC's investment portfolio, making the stock its 9th largest position. Palo Alto Wealth Advisors LLC's holdings in Microsoft were worth $7,432,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of the company. International Assets Investment Management LLC increased its position in shares of Microsoft by 48,526.1% during the 3rd quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 38,501,645 shares of the software giant's stock valued at $16,567,258,000 after purchasing an additional 38,422,466 shares during the last quarter. Wulff Hansen & CO. grew its position in Microsoft by 47,196.6% during the second quarter. Wulff Hansen & CO. now owns 4,834,658 shares of the software giant's stock valued at $2,160,850,000 after acquiring an additional 4,824,436 shares during the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. lifted its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 67.5% in the 3rd quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 5,963,863 shares of the software giant's stock worth $2,566,250,000 after acquiring an additional 2,404,348 shares during the last quarter. Baillie Gifford & Co. grew its holdings in shares of Microsoft by 46.1% during the 3rd quarter. Baillie Gifford & Co. now owns 7,048,244 shares of the software giant's stock valued at $3,032,859,000 after purchasing an additional 2,222,483 shares during the last quarter. Finally, AustralianSuper Pty Ltd lifted its stake in Microsoft by 56.9% in the third quarter. AustralianSuper Pty Ltd now owns 5,344,566 shares of the software giant's stock worth $2,299,767,000 after purchasing an additional 1,938,304 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 71.13% of the company's stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

MSFT has been the topic of a number of recent research reports. Loop Capital raised their price objective on Microsoft from $500.00 to $550.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research note on Monday, December 23rd. Wedbush restated an "outperform" rating and set a $550.00 price target on shares of Microsoft in a research report on Tuesday, November 19th. Stifel Nicolaus boosted their price objective on Microsoft from $475.00 to $515.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 18th. TD Cowen cut their target price on shares of Microsoft from $495.00 to $475.00 and set a "buy" rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, October 31st. Finally, KeyCorp upped their price target on shares of Microsoft from $490.00 to $505.00 and gave the company an "overweight" rating in a report on Friday, October 18th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twenty-six have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average price target of $512.93.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Microsoft news, EVP Judson Althoff sold 25,000 shares of the business's stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $417.00, for a total value of $10,425,000.00. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 117,294 shares in the company, valued at $48,911,598. The trade was a 17.57 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CMO Takeshi Numoto sold 2,500 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 9th. The shares were sold at an average price of $447.41, for a total transaction of $1,118,525.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief marketing officer now directly owns 49,352 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $22,080,578.32. This trade represents a 4.82 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 41,200 shares of company stock valued at $17,383,892 in the last ninety days. 0.03% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Microsoft Stock Performance

Microsoft stock traded up $4.45 during midday trading on Monday, hitting $429.03. 26,146,013 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 17,227,436. The firm has a market capitalization of $3.19 trillion, a PE ratio of 35.40, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.22 and a beta of 0.90. Microsoft Co. has a fifty-two week low of $385.58 and a fifty-two week high of $468.35. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $429.32 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $426.14. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.15, a quick ratio of 1.29 and a current ratio of 1.30.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, October 30th. The software giant reported $3.30 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $3.10 by $0.20. The company had revenue of $65.59 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $64.57 billion. Microsoft had a net margin of 35.61% and a return on equity of 34.56%. The firm's revenue for the quarter was up 16.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $2.99 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Microsoft Co. will post 12.92 earnings per share for the current year.

Microsoft Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 13th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, February 20th will be issued a $0.83 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, February 20th. This represents a $3.32 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.77%. Microsoft's payout ratio is 27.39%.

About Microsoft

Microsoft Corporation develops and supports software, services, devices and solutions worldwide. The Productivity and Business Processes segment offers office, exchange, SharePoint, Microsoft Teams, office 365 Security and Compliance, Microsoft viva, and Microsoft 365 copilot; and office consumer services, such as Microsoft 365 consumer subscriptions, Office licensed on-premises, and other office services.