Wedbush analyst Steve Koenig lowered his price target for Salesforce to $184 from $192, while reiterating an Outperform rating on the stock. The analyst acknowledges that macroeconomic concerns, currency headwinds, and some skepticism about the Tableau acquisition have pressured the shares over the last 30 days, but he expects some relief from the upcoming Q2 results, despite additional FX headwinds. Although Salesforce's sales automation in the U.S. enterprise market is fairly saturated, Koenig's checks see "good opportunity for growth" in international markets and verticals, with the company attacking the latter opportunity by building vertical-specific sales teams across Salesforce's various cloud units. Well-placed industry contacts were relatively positive on the Tableau acquisition, seeing it as a strategic move with good revenue synergy as Salesforce makes the product much more ubiquitous, he adds.

Morgan Stanley notes that Salesforce (CRM) management has advised investors that strategic M&A would be coming back into the company's toolkit at some point and recent press speculation about the company being in advanced talks to buy Informatica (INFA) suggests the company "may be ready to break the ice." While any significant M&A brings execution risks and "increased angst from investors still harboring memories of prior expensive deals," the analyst says a rumored transaction with Informatica, if it were to be confirmed and the deal were to be struck around a $12B enterprise value, looks to meet Salesforce's "criteria for responsible M&A." The firm, which sees potential for a complementary expansion that further buttresses the capabilities of Mulesoft and Data Cloud, has an Overweight rating and $350 price target on Salesforce shares.