We're respecting an overbought market and booking profits in an AI leader facing more competition

We're respecting an overbought market and booking profits in an AI leader facing more competition
Source: CNBC

We're selling 25 shares of Microsoft at roughly $431.42 each. Following Monday's trade, Jim Cramer's Charitable Trust will own 235 shares of MSFT, decreasing its weighting to roughly 2.85% from 3.12%.

Wall Street just wrapped up its best month of 2024 with the S & P 500 gaining 5.7% in November. As a result of the rally, heading into the seasonably strong month of December, the market has become overbought, according to the S & P 500 Short-Range Oscillator.

"A reading above plus 4% indicates an overbought market that could be due for a rest or consolidation," said an analyst.

The Oscillator climbed to plus 5.5.% after Friday's session Reading the Oscillator A reading above plus 4% indicates an overbought market that could be due for a rest or consolidation.

We're only taking profits in Microsoft here, but we'll make more small sales out of discipline should the Oscillator become even more overbought in the coming sessions.

Microsoft has had an OK move since we bought 50 shares at roughly $398 in early August. The stock has gained about 8% but trailed the S & P 500 after the market broadened out to larger beneficiaries like financials and industrials.

"Other software players like Club named Salesforce have made bigger moves too on the idea that Microsoft has given up some ground in its artificial intelligence leadership."

The market has shifted its attention to so-called AI agents from Copilots, which Microsoft got an early jump on due to its backing of ChatGPT creator OpenAI. Salesforce has been getting traction with its Agentforce toolset.

We are not making any changes to our positive long-term view of Microsoft. However, we're downgrading the stock to our rating and making a small trim until we start to see better returns on investment on its aggressive AI spending.

"We will book a gain of roughly 56% on shares purchased in May 2022."