Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Shares Sold by Douglas Lane & Associates LLC

Douglas Lane & Associates LLC cut its holdings in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 4.6% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 30,377 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 1,476 shares during the period. Douglas Lane & Associates LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $10,686,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other large investors also recently bought and sold shares of the business. Morse Asset Management Inc purchased a new stake in shares of Accenture during the third quarter worth about $25,000. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Accenture during the third quarter valued at approximately $30,000. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC lifted its position in shares of Accenture by 607.1% in the third quarter. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC now owns 99 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $35,000 after acquiring an additional 85 shares in the last quarter. RPg Family Wealth Advisory LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Accenture in the third quarter worth approximately $39,000. Finally, Reston Wealth Management LLC acquired a new position in Accenture in the 3rd quarter valued at $51,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts have recently issued reports on ACN shares. UBS Group upped their target price on shares of Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. StockNews.com cut shares of Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Sunday. The Goldman Sachs Group raised shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and raised their target price for the stock from $370.00 to $420.00 in a research note on Friday, December 6th. Robert W. Baird reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and issued a $370.00 price target on shares of Accenture in a report on Tuesday, December 3rd. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada upped their target price on Accenture from $377.00 to $389.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. Nine investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $385.04.

Insider Buying and Selling at Accenture

In other Accenture news, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total transaction of $134,437.50. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 5,149 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,845,916.50. The trade was a 6.79 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the 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 completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 6 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,062.20. The trade was a 99.81 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 36,673 shares of company stock valued at $13,507,099 in the last quarter. Corporate insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Trading Up 0.4 %

ACN stock opened at $357.74 on Thursday. The business’s fifty day moving average price is $357.48 and its 200 day moving average price is $343.37. Accenture plc has a 12-month low of $278.69 and a 12-month high of $387.51. The company has a market capitalization of $223.87 billion, a PE ratio of 31.30, a P/E/G ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a net margin of 11.20% and a return on equity of 26.83%. The business had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $3.27 earnings per share. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 9.0% on a year-over-year basis. Research analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 12.74 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Investors 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 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.65%. Accenture’s payout ratio is 49.66%.

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

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.