Armstrong Henry H Associates Inc. Sells 4,662 Shares of Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT)

Armstrong Henry H Associates Inc. lowered its stake in Microsoft Co. (NASDAQ:MSFT) by 0.7% during the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 674,124 shares of the software giant’s stock after selling 4,662 shares during the period. Microsoft makes up 28.4% of Armstrong Henry H Associates Inc.’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 2nd biggest position. Armstrong Henry H Associates Inc.’s holdings in Microsoft were worth $284,143,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Net Worth Advisory Group bought a new position in shares of Microsoft during the third quarter valued at $2,645,000. Oak Ridge Investments LLC raised its stake in Microsoft by 7.6% during the third quarter. Oak Ridge Investments LLC now owns 263,534 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $113,399,000 after buying an additional 18,544 shares during the last quarter. BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp raised its stake in Microsoft by 1.6% during the second quarter. BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp now owns 1,975,200 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $882,816,000 after buying an additional 31,401 shares during the last quarter. Jacobs & Co. CA raised its stake in Microsoft by 0.9% during the third quarter. Jacobs & Co. CA now owns 96,021 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $41,318,000 after buying an additional 880 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Focus Financial Network Inc. raised its stake in Microsoft by 2.0% during the third quarter. Focus Financial Network Inc. now owns 76,296 shares of the software giant’s stock worth $32,830,000 after buying an additional 1,489 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 71.13% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts recently weighed in on MSFT shares. Cantor Fitzgerald reissued an “overweight” rating and set a $509.00 target price on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Wednesday, January 29th. Piper Sandler reiterated an “overweight” rating and set a $520.00 price objective on shares of Microsoft in a report on Monday, January 27th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut their price target on shares of Microsoft from $470.00 to $465.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, October 31st. DA Davidson reiterated a “neutral” rating and issued a $425.00 target price on shares of Microsoft in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. Finally, Loop Capital boosted their target price on shares of Microsoft from $500.00 to $550.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, December 23rd. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twenty-seven have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $510.96.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Microsoft news, CMO Takeshi Numoto sold 2,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, December 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $430.87, for a total value of $1,077,175.00. Following the sale, the chief marketing officer now owns 53,852 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $23,203,211.24. This trade represents a 4.44 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Insiders have sold a total of 8,000 shares of company stock valued at $3,493,820 in the last quarter. Insiders own 0.03% of the company’s stock.

Microsoft Stock Performance

Microsoft stock opened at $408.25 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.13, a quick ratio of 1.34 and a current ratio of 1.35. Microsoft Co. has a fifty-two week low of $385.58 and a fifty-two week high of $468.35. The firm’s fifty day moving average price is $425.20 and its 200-day moving average price is $422.69. The stock has a market cap of $3.03 trillion, a P/E ratio of 32.87, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.20 and a beta of 0.90.

Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) last released its 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 quarter last year, the company posted $2.93 EPS. On average, equities research analysts expect that Microsoft Co. will post 13.07 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Microsoft Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared 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. This represents a $3.32 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.81%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, February 20th. Microsoft’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 26.73%.

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.