S&P Capital IQ Comments On Salesforce M&A Rumors

In a report published Thursday, S&P Capital IQ analysts maintained a Hold rating on

. According to an unconfirmed news report, CRM is working with financial advisers to help it find takeover offers after being approached by a potential acquirer. "Given CRM's market capitalization of close to $50 billion, we see a limited number of potential suitors," the analysts added. The company's stock traded near an all-time high today, and has a FY16 (Jan.) P/E of more than 100X. "Although we believe large technology players could be very interested in CRM's strong-growth cloud businesses/offerings, we see its large size and premium valuation as challenges for a would-be acquirer," the analysts wrote.