Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Shares Sold by Doliver Advisors LP

Doliver Advisors LP lowered its stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 18.2% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 3,727 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 831 shares during the period. Doliver Advisors LP’s holdings in Accenture were worth $1,311,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in ACN. State Street Corp grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 1.8% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 27,400,836 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $9,685,648,000 after buying an additional 471,792 shares in the last quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA grew its stake in Accenture by 1.2% in the 2nd quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 10,912,962 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $3,311,102,000 after acquiring an additional 131,544 shares during the period. Legal & General Group Plc raised its holdings in Accenture by 1.4% in the 2nd quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 5,887,266 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,786,256,000 after acquiring an additional 80,514 shares during the last quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC lifted its stake 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 purchasing an additional 4,345,039 shares during the period. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. grew its position in shares of Accenture by 1.2% in the third quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 4,823,754 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,705,100,000 after purchasing an additional 56,937 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Price Performance

ACN traded down $3.57 on Monday, reaching $350.28. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 811,349 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,687,557. Accenture plc has a 1 year low of $278.69 and a 1 year high of $387.51. The business’s 50 day moving average is $357.59 and its 200 day moving average is $342.62. The stock has a market cap of $219.20 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.65, 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. The business had revenue of $17.69 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $17.15 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.20% and a return on equity of 26.83%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $3.27 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.74 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Investors of record on Thursday, January 16th will be paid a $1.48 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, January 16th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.69%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 49.66%.

Accenture declared that its board has approved a stock buyback plan on Thursday, September 26th that authorizes the company to buyback $4.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the information technology services provider to purchase up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback plans are usually a sign that the company’s management believes its shares are undervalued.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

ACN has been the topic of a number of research analyst reports. StockNews.com lowered Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Sunday. TD Cowen raised shares of Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their price target for the stock from $321.00 to $400.00 in a research report on Monday, September 30th. Guggenheim boosted their price objective on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, September 27th. Barclays increased their target price on Accenture from $350.00 to $415.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, September 30th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada upped their price target on Accenture from $377.00 to $389.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, September 27th. Nine equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fourteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Accenture presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $383.23.

Insider Activity at Accenture

In other news, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total value of $134,437.50. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 5,149 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,845,916.50. The trade was a 6.79 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 458 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $373.25, for a total value of $170,948.50. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now owns 9,777 shares in the company, valued at $3,649,265.25. This trade represents a 4.47 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 36,673 shares of company stock valued at $13,507,099 over the last three months. 0.02% of the stock is owned by insiders.

About Accenture

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.