Wedbush lifted its price target to $260
It is no secret Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) has been one of the shining stars in the Big Tech rally. The equity has picked up five consecutive highs so far this month, and boasts a more than 56% 12-month lead. And today, it looks like MSFT could run into even more record highs. The stock is up 1.3% at $215.71, after Wedbush hiked its price target by $40 to $260. The analyst noted strong cloud deal activity surrounding Microsoft's Azure during its second quarter, as remote work encourages a shift to cloud software.
This bullish sentiment is echoed throughout Wall Street. In fact, just one of the 25 analysts in coverage call MSFT a "hold," while the other 24 call it a "buy" or better. There's still room for more price-target hikes, however, given the consensus 12-month price target of $206.67 is a 3.7% discount to current levels.
A look at Microsoft's options pits shows calls more than doubling puts. In fact, 267,121 calls were exchanged in the past 10 days, as opposed to just 107,436 puts. Meanwhile, MSFT's Schaeffer's open interest ratio (SOIR) of 0.74 stands higher than just 24% of readings from the past year, implying short-term options traders have been more call-biased than usual.