Market Update: Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) – Slack CEO on why ‘hiring is like online dating’, pitfalls in building company culture

[at American City Business Journals] – At just over three years old, Slack, the messaging and communication platform for business, has become one of the tech industry’s notable success stories marked by strong organic growth and a much-loved product. CEO Stewart Butterfield, who co-founded the company in 2013, has been credited with helping to quickly grow the company from a niche product used by a handful of small tech startups to a multibillion-dollar platform competing with the likes of Microsoft (MSFT). At the New York Times’ New Work Summit in Half Moon Bay, Butterfield discussed candidly the company’s successes and struggles in building an enterprise product, maintaining a strong culture, and how to compete in hiring against bigger companies like Facebook (FB). Read more on this. Microsoft Corporation (MSFT) , valued at $411.52B, started trading this morning at $52.44. Looking at today’s market, MSFT one day range is $51.71 to $52.45 and has traded between $39.72 and $56.85 over the past year. MSFT shares are currently priced at 18.97x this year’s forecasted earnings, which makes them relatively inexpensive compared to the industry’s 20.42x forward p/e ratio. The company pays shareholders $1.44 per share annually in dividends, yielding 2.74%. Consensus earnings for the current quarter by the 28 sell-side analysts covering the stock is an estimate of $0.64 per share, which would be $0.03 better than the year-ago quarter and a $0.05 sequential decrease. In looking at the bigger picture, the full-year EPS estimate of $2.76 would be a $0.30 better when compared to the previous year’s annual results. The quarterly earnings estimate is predicated on a consensus revenue forecast of $22.08 Billion. If reported, that would be a 1.61% increase over the year-ago quarter. More recently, Macquarie Initiated MSFT at Neutral (Mar 4, 2016). Previously, Morgan Stanley upgraded MSFT from Equal-Weight to Overweight. Investors should keep in mind is that the average price target is $58.56, which is 11.67% above where the stock opened this morning. See more in (NASDAQ:MSFT) Similar Articles: Market Update: Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) – Microsoft Makes Windows 10 ‘Free Upgrades’ Worse Stock Update: Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) – MICROSOFT IS UP 10%: Here’s what a one-point move in MSFT does to the Dow Company Update: Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) – Microsoft (MSFT) Stock Up on New Financial Reporting Structure