Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Declares Dividend Increase – $1.48 Per Share

Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) declared a quarterly dividend on Thursday, September 26th, Zacks reports. Shareholders of record on Thursday, October 10th will be paid a dividend of 1.48 per share by the information technology services provider on Friday, November 15th. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.66%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, October 10th. This is an increase from Accenture’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.29.

Accenture has increased its dividend payment by an average of 12.3% per year over the last three years and has raised its dividend annually for the last 19 consecutive years. Accenture has a payout ratio of 40.3% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities research analysts expect Accenture to earn $12.64 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $5.16 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 40.8%.

Accenture Price Performance

Shares of ACN opened at $355.81 on Friday. Accenture has a one year low of $278.69 and a one year high of $387.51. The company has a market cap of $222.98 billion, a P/E ratio of 32.58, a P/E/G ratio of 3.69 and a beta of 1.24. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $333.51 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $321.39.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, September 26th. The information technology services provider reported $2.79 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.77 by $0.02. The business had revenue of $16.41 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $16.37 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 10.79% and a return on equity of 27.48%. The company’s revenue was up 2.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $2.71 earnings per share. On average, analysts expect that Accenture will post 11.95 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, insider Ellyn Shook sold 5,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, July 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $329.82, for a total value of $1,649,100.00. Following the sale, the insider now owns 8,989 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,964,751.98. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. In other Accenture news, insider Ellyn Shook sold 5,000 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, July 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $329.82, for a total value of $1,649,100.00. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now owns 8,989 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,964,751.98. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, General Counsel Joel Unruch sold 8,145 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, July 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $331.05, for a total transaction of $2,696,402.25. Following the completion of the sale, the general counsel now owns 22,849 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $7,564,161.45. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 21,421 shares of company stock worth $6,912,635 in the last quarter. Insiders own 0.07% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

ACN has been the subject of several research analyst reports. Citigroup upped their price target on shares of Accenture from $350.00 to $405.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, September 17th. Piper Sandler Companies restated a “neutral” rating and issued a $329.00 price objective on shares of Accenture in a report on Friday, September 20th. Barclays decreased their price objective on Accenture from $390.00 to $350.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Monday, June 17th. UBS Group upgraded Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $400.00 price objective for the company in a report on Friday, July 19th. Finally, BMO Capital Markets cut their price target on shares of Accenture from $375.00 to $350.00 and set a “market perform” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, June 21st. Ten research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $361.77.

Accenture declared that its Board of Directors has initiated a stock repurchase program on Thursday, September 26th that authorizes the company to buyback $4.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the information technology services provider to purchase up to 1.8% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are usually a sign that the company’s board believes its shares are undervalued.

About Accenture

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.