Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Shares Bought by Integrated Investment Consultants LLC

Integrated Investment Consultants LLC increased its position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN - Free Report) by 225.0% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 3,468 shares of the information technology services provider's stock after purchasing an additional 2,401 shares during the quarter. Integrated Investment Consultants LLC's holdings in Accenture were worth $1,220,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of ACN. FARMERS & MERCHANTS TRUST Co OF LONG BEACH increased its stake in shares of Accenture by 7.1% during the fourth quarter. FARMERS & MERCHANTS TRUST Co OF LONG BEACH now owns 1,177 shares of the information technology services provider's stock valued at $414,000 after buying an additional 78 shares during the period. Retirement Wealth Solutions LLC purchased a new position in Accenture during the 4th quarter valued at about $34,000. Brooklyn Investment Group raised its holdings in shares of Accenture by 5.0% in the 4th quarter. Brooklyn Investment Group now owns 5,965 shares of the information technology services provider's stock valued at $2,098,000 after purchasing an additional 282 shares in the last quarter. Somerset Trust Co increased its holdings in Accenture by 1.9% during the fourth quarter. Somerset Trust Co now owns 12,890 shares of the information technology services provider's stock valued at $4,535,000 after buying an additional 240 shares during the period. Finally, Merit Financial Group LLC raised its stake in Accenture by 212.3% in the fourth quarter. Merit Financial Group LLC now owns 14,212 shares of the information technology services provider's stock worth $5,000,000 after buying an additional 9,661 shares in the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research analysts have recently commented on the company. TD Cowen raised Accenture from a "hold" rating to a "buy" rating and boosted their price target for the stock from $321.00 to $400.00 in a research report on Monday, September 30th. BMO Capital Markets raised their price target on shares of Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the company a "market perform" rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. Guggenheim increased their target price on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. Jefferies Financial Group upped their price target on Accenture from $355.00 to $385.00 and gave the stock a "hold" rating in a research report on Friday, December 20th. Finally, Barclays upped their target price on Accenture from $350.00 to $415.00 and gave the company an "overweight" rating in a research report on Monday, September 30th. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have issued a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $385.04.

Accenture Stock Performance

ACN stock traded up $1.77 during midday trading on Friday, hitting $352.33. 4,061,199 shares of the stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 2,320,392. The stock's fifty day simple moving average is $357.59 and its 200-day simple moving average is $345.65. The firm has a market cap of $220.49 billion, a P/E ratio of 29.56, a PEG ratio of 3.11 and a beta of 1.24. Accenture plc has a 1-year low of $278.69 and a 1-year high of $387.51. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.47.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The company had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.15 billion. During the same period last year, the company earned $3.27 earnings per share. Accenture's quarterly revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, analysts expect that Accenture plc will post 12.69 earnings per share for the current year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be paid a dividend of $1.48 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, January 16th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.68%. Accenture's dividend payout ratio is currently 49.66%.

Accenture declared that its Board of Directors has approved a share buyback program on Thursday, September 26th that authorizes the company to buyback $4.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the information technology services provider to reacquire up to 1.8% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are typically an indication that the company's board believes its stock is undervalued.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $343.70, for a total value of $1,096,746.70. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 6 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $2,062.20. This trade represents a 99.81 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the company's stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total transaction of $134,437.50. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 5,149 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $1,845,916.50. This represents a 6.79 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 26,125 shares of company stock worth $9,570,260 in the last 90 days. Insiders own 0.02% of the company's stock.

Accenture Profile

Accenture plc, a professional services company, provides strategy and consulting, industry X, song, and technology and operation services worldwide. The company offers application services, including agile transformation, DevOps, application modernization, enterprise architecture, software and quality engineering, data management; intelligent automation comprising robotic process automation, natural language processing, and virtual agents; and application management services, as well as software engineering services; strategy and consulting services; data and analytics strategy, data discovery and augmentation, data management and beyond, data democratization, and industrialized solutions comprising turnkey analytics and artificial intelligence (AI) solutions; metaverse; and sustainability services.