Zacks Investment Management raised its stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN - Free Report) by 17.3% during the third quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 115,010 shares of the information technology services provider's stock after acquiring an additional 16,946 shares during the quarter. Zacks Investment Management's holdings in Accenture were worth $40,654,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.
Several other hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Masso Torrence Wealth Management Inc. boosted its position in Accenture by 2.0% during the third quarter. Masso Torrence Wealth Management Inc. now owns 1,447 shares of the information technology services provider's stock worth $511,000 after purchasing an additional 28 shares during the period. BSW Wealth Partners lifted its stake in shares of Accenture by 0.7% in the third quarter. BSW Wealth Partners now owns 4,077 shares of the information technology services provider's stock worth $1,441,000 after buying an additional 28 shares during the last quarter. Slow Capital Inc. grew its stake in Accenture by 0.3% in the 3rd quarter. Slow Capital Inc. now owns 9,067 shares of the information technology services provider's stock valued at $3,205,000 after buying an additional 29 shares during the last quarter. Tradition Wealth Management LLC raised its holdings in Accenture by 0.3% in the 3rd quarter. Tradition Wealth Management LLC now owns 10,951 shares of the information technology services provider's stock worth $3,871,000 after acquiring an additional 29 shares during the period. Finally, NBC Securities Inc. lifted its position in Accenture by 0.6% during the 3rd quarter. NBC Securities Inc. now owns 5,206 shares of the information technology services provider's stock worth $1,840,000 after acquiring an additional 30 shares during the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.
Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades
ACN has been the topic of a number of recent analyst reports. BNP Paribas lowered Accenture from an "outperform" rating to a "neutral" rating and set a $375.00 price objective on the stock. in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Barclays upped their price target on Accenture from $350.00 to $415.00 and gave the stock an "overweight" rating in a report on Monday, September 30th. UBS Group boosted their target price on shares of Accenture from $400.00 to $415.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. Piper Sandler raised shares of Accenture from a "neutral" rating to an "overweight" rating and increased their price target for the company from $329.00 to $395.00 in a report on Thursday, September 26th. Finally, Guggenheim boosted their price objective on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $395.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. Nine equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fourteen have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $372.09.
Check Out Our Latest Stock Report on Accenture
Accenture Trading Up 1.3 %
ACN stock traded up $4.57 during trading on Friday, hitting $362.70. 2,332,307 shares of the stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 2,369,316. The stock has a market cap of $226.75 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 31.73, a P/E/G ratio of 3.19 and a beta of 1.24. Accenture plc has a one year low of $278.69 and a one year high of $387.51. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $359.88 and a 200 day simple moving average of $332.26.
Accenture (NYSE:ACN - Get Free Report) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, September 26th. The information technology services provider reported $2.79 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.78 by $0.01. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.83% and a net margin of 11.20%. The business had revenue of $16.41 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $16.37 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $2.71 EPS. Accenture's revenue was up 2.6% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 12.76 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.
Accenture Increases Dividend
The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, October 10th were given a dividend of $1.48 per share. This is an increase from Accenture's previous quarterly dividend of $1.29. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, October 10th. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.63%. Accenture's dividend payout ratio is 51.79%.
Accenture announced that its board has initiated a share repurchase program on Thursday, September 26th that allows the company to buyback $4.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization allows the information technology services provider to repurchase up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback programs are often an indication that the company's board believes its shares are undervalued.
Insiders Place Their Bets
In other Accenture news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 458 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Thursday, October 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $373.25, for a total value of $170,948.50. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now owns 9,777 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $3,649,265.25. This represents a 4.47 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 9,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, October 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $376.16, for a total transaction of $3,385,440.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 20,324 shares in the company, valued at $7,645,075.84. This represents a 30.69 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 36,298 shares of company stock valued at $13,372,661 in the last 90 days. 0.07% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.
Accenture Company Profile
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Free Report)
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.
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