Carlson Capital Management Trims Stock Position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Carlson Capital Management cut its position in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 0.5% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 31,020 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 161 shares during the period. Accenture makes up 0.5% of Carlson Capital Management’s holdings, making the stock its 17th biggest holding. Carlson Capital Management’s holdings in Accenture were worth $10,913,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in ACN. State Street Corp grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 1.8% in the third 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. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC lifted its position in shares of 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 buying an additional 4,345,039 shares during the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its position in shares of Accenture by 2.9% during the 4th quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 4,964,480 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,746,455,000 after buying an additional 140,726 shares during the last quarter. Amundi raised its position in Accenture by 27.9% in the 4th quarter. Amundi now owns 3,790,069 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,353,909,000 after purchasing an additional 826,038 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Swedbank AB raised its position in Accenture by 47.5% in the 4th quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 3,763,690 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,324,029,000 after purchasing an additional 1,212,011 shares during the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insider Transactions at Accenture

In related news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 1,487 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, January 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.54, for a total transaction of $527,200.98. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 9,247 shares in the company, valued at $3,278,431.38. This trade represents a 13.85 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction 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 completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 11,858 shares in the company, valued at $4,677,625.26. The trade was a 42.58 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders sold 22,280 shares of company stock valued at $8,316,190. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Accenture Stock Up 2.3 %

Shares of NYSE:ACN opened at $326.25 on Tuesday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.47, a current ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17. Accenture plc has a 52-week low of $278.69 and a 52-week high of $398.35. The company has a 50 day moving average of $362.51 and a two-hundred day moving average of $358.14. The company has a market capitalization of $204.16 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 27.37, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates 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 the consensus estimate of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $3.27 earnings per share. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages have issued reports on ACN. Stifel Nicolaus dropped their price objective on shares of Accenture from $390.00 to $380.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, February 26th. Piper Sandler lowered their price objective on shares of Accenture from $429.00 to $396.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday. Wolfe Research raised shares of Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price objective on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, January 8th. UBS Group upped their target price on shares of Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. Finally, Morgan Stanley cut their price objective on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $372.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a report on Monday. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, sixteen have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $388.04.

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.