Edgestream Partners L.P. Makes New Investment in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Edgestream Partners L.P. acquired a new stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the SEC. The institutional investor acquired 2,896 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $1,019,000.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Newbridge Financial Services Group Inc. grew its stake in shares of Accenture by 5.7% during the fourth quarter. Newbridge Financial Services Group Inc. now owns 518 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $182,000 after acquiring an additional 28 shares during the last quarter. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. grew its position in Accenture by 62.2% during the 4th quarter. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. now owns 73 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $28,000 after purchasing an additional 28 shares during the last quarter. Tradition Wealth Management LLC grew its position in Accenture by 0.3% during the 3rd quarter. Tradition Wealth Management LLC now owns 10,951 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $3,871,000 after purchasing an additional 29 shares during the last quarter. New England Professional Planning Group Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Accenture by 4.6% in the fourth quarter. New England Professional Planning Group Inc. now owns 655 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $230,000 after buying an additional 29 shares during the last quarter. Finally, TCW Group Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 0.3% during the third quarter. TCW Group Inc. now owns 11,501 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $4,065,000 after buying an additional 30 shares during the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insider Activity

In related news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 232 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $394.46, for a total transaction of $91,514.72. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 8,915 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,516,610.90. This represents a 2.54 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $394.47, for a total transaction of $3,468,574.71. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 11,858 shares in the company, valued at $4,677,625.26. This trade represents a 42.58 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 22,280 shares of company stock worth $8,316,190 over the last quarter. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages recently issued reports on ACN. Wolfe Research upgraded Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 target price for the company in a research note on Wednesday, January 8th. Piper Sandler raised their price objective on Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. Stifel Nicolaus dropped their target price on Accenture from $390.00 to $380.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, February 26th. Robert W. Baird reissued a “neutral” rating and set a $370.00 price target on shares of Accenture in a research report on Tuesday, December 3rd. Finally, UBS Group upped their price objective on shares of Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. Nine analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Accenture currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $388.96.

Accenture Price Performance

Shares of NYSE ACN opened at $327.79 on Wednesday. The firm has a market cap of $205.13 billion, a PE ratio of 27.50, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The firm has a fifty day moving average of $364.92 and a 200 day moving average of $358.63. 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 plc has a one year low of $278.69 and a one year high of $398.35.

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

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.