Sarasin & Partners LLP Purchases 496,086 Shares of Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT)

Sarasin & Partners LLP boosted its holdings in shares of Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT - Free Report) by 33.5% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 1,977,464 shares of the software giant's stock after acquiring an additional 496,086 shares during the quarter. Microsoft comprises 9.2% of Sarasin & Partners LLP's holdings, making the stock its largest holding. Sarasin & Partners LLP's holdings in Microsoft were worth $833,501,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in MSFT. International Assets Investment Management LLC increased its holdings in Microsoft by 48,526.1% in 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. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. grew its stake in shares of Microsoft by 76.6% in the fourth quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 10,532,402 shares of the software giant's stock valued at $4,439,407,000 after buying an additional 4,568,539 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its stake in Microsoft by 2.0% during the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 165,024,812 shares of the software giant's stock worth $70,790,682,000 after acquiring an additional 3,264,648 shares in the last quarter. Baillie Gifford & Co. boosted its holdings in 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 acquiring an additional 2,222,483 shares during the period. Finally, UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC grew its position in Microsoft by 4.1% in the 3rd quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 54,590,791 shares of the software giant's stock valued at $23,490,417,000 after acquiring an additional 2,125,030 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 71.13% of the company's stock.

Microsoft Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:MSFT traded down $4.13 during midday trading on Thursday, hitting $396.89. 23,268,830 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 23,118,146. The stock has a market cap of $2.95 trillion, a P/E ratio of 31.96, a PEG ratio of 2.21 and a beta of 0.92. Microsoft Co. has a twelve month low of $381.00 and a twelve month high of $468.35. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $417.97 and a 200-day moving average price of $422.24. The company has a current ratio of 1.35, a quick ratio of 1.34 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.13.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 29th. The software giant reported $3.23 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.15 by $0.08. Microsoft had a net margin of 35.43% and a return on equity of 33.36%. During the same period last year, the firm earned $2.93 EPS. On average, research analysts forecast that Microsoft Co. will post 13.08 earnings per share for the current year.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

MSFT has been the subject of several recent research reports. Morgan Stanley lowered their price objective on shares of Microsoft from $540.00 to $530.00 and set an "overweight" rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. DA Davidson reiterated a "neutral" rating and issued a $425.00 target price on shares of Microsoft in a report on Thursday, January 30th. UBS Group lowered their target price on shares of Microsoft from $525.00 to $510.00 and set a "buy" rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. Wedbush reiterated an "outperform" rating and issued a $550.00 price objective on shares of Microsoft in a report on Tuesday, November 19th. Finally, Guggenheim reaffirmed a "neutral" rating on shares of Microsoft in a research report on Friday, January 24th. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twenty-six have issued a buy rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average price target of $510.96.

Insider Buying and Selling at Microsoft

In other Microsoft news, CMO Takeshi Numoto sold 2,500 shares of Microsoft stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 9th. The shares were sold at an average price of $447.41, for a total value 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. The trade was a 4.82 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. 0.03% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Microsoft Company Profile

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.