KLP Kapitalforvaltning AS Makes New Investment in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

KLP Kapitalforvaltning AS bought a new position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm bought 238,506 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $83,904,000.

Several other large investors also recently made changes to their positions in ACN. Morse Asset Management Inc bought a new position in Accenture in the third quarter valued at $25,000. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. increased its holdings in Accenture by 62.2% in the 4th quarter. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. now owns 73 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $28,000 after buying an additional 28 shares during the period. Kohmann Bosshard Financial Services LLC bought a new stake in shares of Accenture during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $30,000. POM Investment Strategies LLC grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 64.2% during 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. Finally, Retirement Wealth Solutions LLC bought a new stake in shares of Accenture during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $34,000. Institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research firms have weighed in on ACN. UBS Group reduced their target price on shares of Accenture from $455.00 to $387.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Friday. Piper Sandler dropped their target price on shares of Accenture from $396.00 to $364.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday. Guggenheim lowered their price objective on shares of Accenture from $400.00 to $395.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Friday. Robert W. Baird upgraded shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $390.00 target price for the company in a research note on Monday, March 17th. Finally, Mizuho reduced their price target on shares of Accenture from $428.00 to $398.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $380.05.

Insider Buying and Selling at Accenture

In other news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 232 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 5th. The shares were 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 of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,516,610.90. The trade was a 2.54 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CFO Angie Y. Park sold 685 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $354.38, for a total transaction of $242,750.30. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 8,674 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,073,892.12. The trade was a 7.32 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders sold 22,280 shares of company stock valued at $8,316,190. Corporate insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Trading Up 1.4 %

ACN stock opened at $305.17 on Friday. The stock has a market cap of $190.97 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.60, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The business’s 50-day moving average is $359.16 and its 200 day moving average is $357.13. Accenture plc has a 12-month low of $278.69 and a 12-month high of $398.35. The company has a current ratio of 1.47, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.81 by $0.01. The business had revenue of $16.70 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $16.64 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The company’s revenue was up 5.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $2.77 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 12.73 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, April 10th will be issued a $1.48 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, April 10th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.94%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 49.66%.

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.