Capital Investment Advisors LLC Increases Stake in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Capital Investment Advisors LLC grew its holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 142.0% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 7,058 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 4,141 shares during the period. Capital Investment Advisors LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $2,483,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Other large investors have also modified their holdings of the company. State Street Corp raised its position in Accenture by 1.8% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 27,400,836 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $9,685,648,000 after purchasing an additional 471,792 shares in the last quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA increased its stake in shares of Accenture by 1.2% during the second quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 10,912,962 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $3,311,102,000 after buying an additional 131,544 shares during the period. Legal & General Group Plc raised its holdings in Accenture by 1.4% in the second quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 5,887,266 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,786,256,000 after acquiring an additional 80,514 shares in the last quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC grew its holdings in Accenture by 378.9% during the 3rd quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 5,491,736 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,941,219,000 after acquiring an additional 4,345,039 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. increased its position in shares of Accenture by 1.2% in the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 4,823,754 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,705,100,000 after purchasing an additional 56,937 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Stock Performance

ACN stock opened at $349.14 on Tuesday. Accenture plc has a one year low of $278.69 and a one year high of $387.51. The company has a fifty day moving average of $357.93 and a 200-day moving average of $344.63. The stock has a market capitalization of $218.49 billion, a PE ratio of 30.55, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.43 by $0.16. The company had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.15 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.83% and a net margin of 11.20%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $3.27 EPS. Equities analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.74 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be given a dividend of $1.48 per share. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, January 16th. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.70%. Accenture’s payout ratio is currently 49.66%.

Accenture announced that its Board of Directors has approved a share repurchase plan 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 plans are generally an indication that the company’s board believes its shares are undervalued.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

ACN has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. BMO Capital Markets boosted their target price on shares of Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research note on Friday, December 20th. TD Cowen upgraded Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and increased their price objective for the company from $321.00 to $400.00 in a report on Monday, September 30th. Piper Sandler boosted their target price on Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. Guggenheim increased their price target on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, September 27th. Finally, StockNews.com upgraded shares of Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have given a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $385.04.

Insider Activity

In other Accenture news, COO John F. Walsh sold 5,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $373.24, for a total value of $1,866,200.00. Following the sale, the chief operating officer now owns 17,593 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $6,566,411.32. This represents a 22.13 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $343.70, for a total transaction of $1,096,746.70. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 6 shares in the company, valued at $2,062.20. This represents a 99.81 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 36,673 shares of company stock worth $13,507,099 in the last 90 days. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

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.