No fewer than 9 analysts hiked their price targets on MSFT
Analysts are giving plenty of attention to Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) this morning, after the company's upbeat fiscal first-quarter earnings report. Specifically, nine price-target hikes were dished out for the tech name, after it announced a revenue beat. Microsoft attributed the strong results to substantial growth in its cloud computing unit.
Microsoft stock is up 2.2% to trade at a fresh all-time high of $316.90 at last check. The equity has been ripping up the charts since the beginning of the year, with a handful of pullbacks captured by the 100-day moving average. Year-to-date, MSFT is up 39.4%.
Circling back to analyst praise, the largest bull notes came from Stifel and RBC, both of which hiked their price objectives to $380 -- a 22.5% premium to last night's close. The brokerage bunch was already bullish towards MSFT, with all 19 in coverage calling it a "strong buy."
This bullishness is echoed in the options pits. The security's 10-day call/put volume ratio of 2.41 at the International Securities Exchange (ISE), Chicago Board Options Exchange (CBOE), and NASDAQ OMX PHLX (PHLX) ranks in the 79th percentile of readings from the past 12 months, indicating an unusually healthy appetite for calls over the last two weeks.
Now looks like an affordable time to jump aboard MSFT with options. This is per the stock's Schaeffer's Volatility Index (SVI) of 21%, which stands in the low 22nd percentile of its annual range. This suggests near-term options traders are pricing in relatively low volatility expectations right now.