Salesforce is looking interesting on a DCF basis, but the entire bull case hinges on one number. Anyone else digging into this?

CRM has gotten crushed in the broader SaaS/tech selloff, down nearly 50% from its highs near $365 in late 2024. The whole enterprise software space has been under pressure as the market rotates out of anything AI-adjacent that hasn't immediately monetized, and Salesforce has been caught up in that despite posting record revenue and margins. So I figured it was worth running a proper DCF to see if the selloff has created an actual opportunity or if the market knows something. The headline result looks compelling. Stockoscope shows an intrinsic value of roughly $320 versus a $195 market price, implying about 65% upside. 10% revenue growth from analyst consensus (42 analysts covering), 9.4% WACC from market data, nothing crazy in the inputs. The stock is sitting at 15x EV/EBITDA, 24x earnings, 8% free cash flow yield - not screamingly cheap but not expensive either for a dominant SaaS platform growing in the double digits. But the entire valuation swings on one assumption: EBITDA margin. Salesforce's current EBITDA margin is about 31%. They've done an incredible job expanding it. It was 14.5% in FY2022, so they've more than doubled it in four years. But the analyst consensus that feeds into the DCF model is projecting margins reaching 49%. That's a massive jump from where they are today. I ran a sensitivity table on it. Here are the results: |**EBITDA Margin**|**Intrinsic Value**|**Upside vs $195**| |:-|:-|:-| |32% (today)|$205 |5%| |38%|$246 |26%| |44%|$287 |47%| |49% (analyst consensus)|$323 |66%| So, at current margins, you're basically paying fair value. The entire margin of safety comes from believing margins will expand significantly from here. Even getting halfway there (to 38%) gives you decent upside, but 49% is a big number for a company that has to keep investing heavily in AI and still competes against Microsoft, ServiceNow, and others. What's interesting is that multiples tell a similar story. Compared to 80 tech sector peers, the median peer-implied fair value comes to about $261, roughly 34% upside. So both DCF and relative valuation point to undervaluation. Two questions for the group: \- For those of you who use analyst consensus estimates in your models - how much weight do you actually put on them? In this case, the margin estimates seem to be doing a LOT of heavy lifting. Do you haircut them, use your own assumptions, or just take them as-is? \- If you're looking at CRM right now, what margin assumption are you using? Curious whether people think 49% is realistic or if the market is right to be skeptical. Not investment advice. DYOR.