We recently published a list of Jim Cramer’s Latest Portfolio: Top 10 Calls Before August. Since Salesforce Inc (NYSE:CRM) ranks 1st on the list, it deserves a deeper look.
Earlier this month, Jim Cramer during his program on CNBC talked about the importance of optimism right now and explained why he sees hope for America in the future.
Cramer said that the recent political violence made things look “dark” and “grim.” The CNBC host said this election year has been a “mess, something very much in sync with the tone of the country.”
However, Cramer referred to the recent comments from the CEO of the world’s largest investment manager, and said it seems the end of the world is “not on the table.” Cramer called the executive’s comments a “breath of fresh air” and agreed with the notion that the US economy needs more growth and less business regulation. Cramer said that America has a huge deficit problem but it cannot tax its way out of this.
“But we can grow our way out of it.”
Cramer said we should understand that capitalism is a “force for good, a force for wealth generation, not just for the rich, but for everybody, as long as they invest.”
Jim Cramer urged his viewers to invest in individual stocks.
“I don’t care what you invest in, as long as you invest.”
For this article we watched the latest programs of Jim Cramer and picked 10 stocks he’s talking about. With each stock we have mentioned hedge fund sentiment. Why are we interested in the stocks that hedge funds pile into? The reason is simple: our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds. Our quarterly newsletter’s strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 275% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 150 percentage points (see more details here).
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Salesforce Inc (NYSE:CRM)
Number of Hedge Fund Investors: 154
Jim Cramer said in a latest program that Salesforce Inc (NYSE:CRM) is a “hold” here and he’d own the stock. Cramer said he sold some Salesforce shares when they were higher for his charitable trust.
According to Yahoo Finance data, Salesforce Inc (NYSE:CRM) is expected to see earnings growth of about 16% on a per-annum basis over the next five years. Data also shows the company is expected to deliver double-digit YoY EPS growth in the next ten out of eleven quarters.
While Salesforce Inc (NYSE:CRM) is primarily a customer relationship software company, with notable tools and platforms like Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Marketing Cloud, Tableau, MuleSoft, and Slack, its most promising platform is Data Cloud when it comes to AI and software. The platform has 90% year-over-year growth and clocking in $400 million in FY2024. What does this platform do? It helps organizations process data from various departments and third-party cloud solutions. Powered by an AI-driven data engine, it analyzes metadata in real-time to provide valuable insights, supporting sales, marketing, and customer service workflows.
As of the end of Q1 Salesforce Inc (NYSE:CRM) had $17.7 billion in cash and low financial leverage.
Mizuho Securities analyst Gregg Moskowitz thinks the company is still “well situated” to help customers in digital transformation. However, the analyst thinks Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM) would do so by prioritizing profitable growth. The analyst reiterated his Buy rating on the stock but cut his price target to $300 from $345.
Morgan Stanley analyst Keith Weiss, who has an Overweight rating and a $320 price target on Salesforce Inc. (NYSE:CRM), said that Salesforce’s PEG ratio of 1.2 shows the market is not pricing in operational discipline and earnings growth sustainability.
“We continue to view GenAI as a tailwind for Salesforce, with benefits likely coming in CY25, but at these levels, GenAI represents a call option.”
Polen Focus Growth Strategy stated the following regarding Salesforce, Inc. (NYSE:CRM) in its Q2 2024 investor letter:
“Salesforce, Inc. (NYSE:CRM) declined nearly 20% due to a slowdown in revenue and bookings growth, part of a wider trend we’ve observed across enterprise software as companies defer spending on large projects given the uncertain macroeconomic environment. As mentioned, there has been an emerging narrative about prioritized spending on AI, cloud, and security over enterprise software spending that could eventually impair seat-based software over the longer term. Though there may be some near-term shifts in dollars toward GenAI, we believe the market for mission-critical enterprise software will remain robust well into the future. We will monitor the position closely, but we continue to believe that Salesforce is well-placed with its mission-critical software and high customer retention rates to weather these headwinds, lean on pricing power, and effectively monetize generative AI in its product suite.”
Overall, Salesforce Inc (NYSE:CRM) ranks 1st on Insider Monkey’s list titled Jim Cramer’s Latest Portfolio: Top 10 Calls Before August. While we acknowledge the potential of Salesforce Inc (NYSE:CRM), our conviction lies in the belief that AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns, and doing so within a shorter timeframe. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than CRM but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.
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Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.
