Bahl & Gaynor Inc. Has $142.13 Million Holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Bahl & Gaynor Inc. trimmed its stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 4.1% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 404,005 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 17,118 shares during the period. Bahl & Gaynor Inc. owned approximately 0.06% of Accenture worth $142,125,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of the stock. Morse Asset Management Inc bought a new position in Accenture in the 3rd quarter valued at $25,000. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. boosted its holdings in Accenture by 62.2% in the fourth quarter. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. now owns 73 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $28,000 after acquiring an additional 28 shares during the last quarter. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. acquired a new stake in Accenture in the third quarter worth about $30,000. Kohmann Bosshard Financial Services LLC bought a new stake in Accenture during the 4th quarter worth about $30,000. Finally, POM Investment Strategies LLC boosted its stake in shares of Accenture by 64.2% in the 4th quarter. POM Investment Strategies LLC now owns 87 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $31,000 after purchasing an additional 34 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Insider Activity at Accenture

In other Accenture news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 232 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $394.46, for a total value of $91,514.72. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 8,915 shares in the company, valued at $3,516,610.90. This trade represents a 2.54 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 2,497 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, January 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.48, for a total value of $885,136.56. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 28,866 shares in the company, valued at approximately $10,232,419.68. This represents a 7.96 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 22,280 shares of company stock valued at $8,316,190. 0.02% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages recently weighed in on ACN. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price objective on shares of Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, December 16th. Robert W. Baird restated a “neutral” rating and issued a $370.00 price target on shares of Accenture in a research report on Tuesday, December 3rd. BMO Capital Markets increased their target price on Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research note on Friday, December 20th. Morgan Stanley boosted their target price on Accenture from $335.00 to $380.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group upgraded shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and increased their price target for the company from $370.00 to $420.00 in a research report on Friday, December 6th. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Accenture presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $388.96.

Accenture Trading Down 1.1 %

NYSE ACN opened at $344.57 on Tuesday. The stock has a market capitalization of $215.63 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 28.91, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. Accenture plc has a 52 week low of $278.69 and a 52 week high of $398.35. The stock’s 50 day moving average price is $366.99 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $358.24. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a current ratio of 1.47.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The business had revenue of $17.69 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $3.27 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue was up 9.0% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

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.