Woodmont Investment Counsel LLC Sells 72 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Woodmont Investment Counsel LLC cut its position in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 1.5% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 4,719 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 72 shares during the period. Woodmont Investment Counsel LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $1,660,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in ACN. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC boosted its position in Accenture by 378.9% in 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 valued at $1,941,219,000 after buying an additional 4,345,039 shares during the period. Raymond James Financial Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Accenture in the 4th quarter worth approximately $666,495,000. Swedbank AB lifted its position in shares of Accenture by 47.5% in the 4th quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 3,763,690 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,324,029,000 after purchasing an additional 1,212,011 shares during the period. Proficio Capital Partners LLC raised its stake in shares of Accenture by 51,837.3% during the 4th quarter. Proficio Capital Partners LLC now owns 860,601 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $302,751,000 after acquiring an additional 858,944 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Amundi raised its stake in shares of Accenture by 27.9% during the 4th quarter. Amundi now owns 3,790,069 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,353,909,000 after acquiring an additional 826,038 shares in the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insider Buying and Selling at Accenture

In other news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of the company’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. The trade was a 42.58 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 1,487 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, January 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.54, for a total value of $527,200.98. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now owns 9,247 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,278,431.38. This trade represents a 13.85 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 21,905 shares of company stock valued at $8,181,753 in the last 90 days. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of brokerages have issued reports on ACN. Guggenheim cut their price target on shares of Accenture from $400.00 to $395.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday. Robert W. Baird upgraded shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $390.00 price target on the stock in a research report on Monday, March 17th. UBS Group dropped their price target on shares of Accenture from $455.00 to $387.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday. Royal Bank of Canada dropped their target price on shares of Accenture from $399.00 to $392.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday. Finally, BMO Capital Markets dropped their target price on shares of Accenture from $425.00 to $370.00 and set a “market perform” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, March 18th. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $380.05.

Accenture Trading Up 1.4 %

Shares of ACN stock opened at $305.17 on Monday. Accenture plc has a 1-year low of $278.69 and a 1-year high of $398.35. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $359.16 and its 200-day simple moving average is $357.33. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.47. The firm has a market cap of $190.97 billion, a P/E ratio of 25.60, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.81 by $0.01. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The firm had revenue of $16.70 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $16.64 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $2.77 earnings per share. Accenture’s revenue for the quarter was up 5.7% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.73 EPS for the current year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

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

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.