BUZZ-Salesforce rises as TD Cowen turns bullish after stock's pull back

Shares of cloud software seller Salesforce CRM.N up 2.2% premarket to $326.90 after TD Cowen upgraded to 'buy' from 'hold'

TD Cowen boosts PT by $20 to $400, implying 25% upside to stock's last close

Following strong end of 2024 rally amid excitement around Agentforce, CRM shares have pulled back and present a compelling entry point, TD Cowen said in note to clients

Recent checks on Agentforce encouraging, TD Cowen said, highlighting feedback from several partners, including: favorable reception on pricing, ease-of-use; expectation of strong adoption over the next 12 months; a "halo effect" around other products like Data Cloud, Mulesoft and Einstein Copilot

TD Cowen said CRM shares trade at ~20x EV/CY26E free cash flow, and its new PT ascribes multiple of ~24x

Last month CRM said it closed more 1,000 paid deals for Agentforce, its AI-powered platform for creating virtual representatives

Now, of 52 analysts covering CRM, recommendation breakdown is 40 "strong buy" or "buy", 10 "hold" and 2 "strong sell"; median PT is $414, LSEG data shows

Through Thurs close, shares down 4% to start 2025 and off ~13% from record intraday high of $369 hit in early Dec

In 2024, stock notched 27% gain vs ~36% advance in S&P 500 Tech sector .SPLRCT and 23% rise in S&P 500 .SPX

(Lance Tupper is a Reuters market analyst. The views expressed are his own)

((lance.tupper@tr.com 1-646-279-6380))