Analysts Set Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) PT at $378.91

Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) has received a consensus recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from the twenty-three ratings firms that are covering the firm, Marketbeat.com reports. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. The average 1 year price objective among brokers that have covered the stock in the last year is $378.23.

A number of equities analysts have recently weighed in on ACN shares. Guggenheim cut their target price on Accenture from $400.00 to $395.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, March 21st. Royal Bank of Canada cut their price objective on Accenture from $399.00 to $392.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, March 21st. Piper Sandler lowered their target price on Accenture from $396.00 to $364.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, March 20th. Baird R W upgraded shares of Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Monday, March 17th. Finally, Morgan Stanley lowered their price objective on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $372.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, March 17th.

Accenture Trading Down 0.9 %

NYSE ACN opened at $308.51 on Tuesday. Accenture has a 52 week low of $278.69 and a 52 week high of $398.35. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $355.92 and a 200-day moving average price of $356.23. The company has a quick ratio of 1.47, a current ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17. The company has a market cap of $193.06 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.88, a P/E/G ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.81 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $16.70 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $16.64 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 5.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $2.77 earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts expect that Accenture will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, April 10th will be given a dividend of $1.48 per share. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, April 10th. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.92%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is presently 48.89%.

Insider Activity

In related news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $394.47, for a total value of $3,468,574.71. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 11,858 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,677,625.26. This trade represents a 42.58 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 961 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $354.47, for a total value of $340,645.67. Following the sale, the insider now owns 5,484 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,943,913.48. This represents a 14.91 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders sold 21,905 shares of company stock worth $8,181,753. Insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Accenture

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of ACN. Baldwin Wealth Partners LLC MA grew its stake in Accenture by 6.5% during the fourth quarter. Baldwin Wealth Partners LLC MA now owns 63,429 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $22,314,000 after acquiring an additional 3,883 shares in the last quarter. Davidson Trust Co. increased its holdings in shares of Accenture by 7.4% in the fourth quarter. Davidson Trust Co. now owns 2,307 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $812,000 after purchasing an additional 158 shares during the last quarter. Franklin Street Advisors Inc. NC lifted its position in shares of Accenture by 126.8% in the fourth quarter. Franklin Street Advisors Inc. NC now owns 40,051 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $14,090,000 after buying an additional 22,391 shares in the last quarter. China Universal Asset Management Co. Ltd. boosted its stake in Accenture by 37.5% during the fourth quarter. China Universal Asset Management Co. Ltd. now owns 3,094 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,088,000 after buying an additional 843 shares during the last quarter. Finally, SteelPeak Wealth LLC increased its stake in Accenture by 127.1% in the 4th quarter. SteelPeak Wealth LLC now owns 2,323 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $817,000 after acquiring an additional 1,300 shares during the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Accenture Company 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.