Daymark Wealth Partners LLC Lowers Stock Holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Daymark Wealth Partners LLC lessened its stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 4.0% in the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 5,850 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 241 shares during the period. Daymark Wealth Partners LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $2,058,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other large investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. State Street Corp raised its position in shares of Accenture by 1.8% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 27,400,836 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $9,685,648,000 after purchasing an additional 471,792 shares during the last quarter. Legal & General Group Plc raised its holdings in Accenture by 1.4% in the second quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 5,887,266 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,786,256,000 after buying 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% in the third 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 in the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 1.2% during 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 buying an additional 56,937 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Clearbridge Investments LLC increased its position in shares of Accenture by 44.7% during the second quarter. Clearbridge Investments LLC now owns 2,709,989 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $822,238,000 after acquiring an additional 837,677 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several analysts have commented on the company. Piper Sandler increased their target price on Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. The Goldman Sachs Group upgraded Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their price objective for the stock from $370.00 to $420.00 in a report on Friday, December 6th. BMO Capital Markets raised their price target on shares of Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. Wolfe Research raised shares of Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price objective for the company in a report on Wednesday, January 8th. Finally, BNP Paribas cut shares of Accenture from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $375.00 target price on the stock. in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $383.74.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Accenture news, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, November 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $343.70, for a total transaction of $1,096,746.70. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 6 shares in the company, valued at $2,062.20. This trade represents a 99.81 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total transaction of $134,437.50. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now owns 5,149 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,845,916.50. This trade represents a 6.79 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 17,332 shares of company stock worth $6,172,719 in the last 90 days. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Accenture Price Performance

NYSE:ACN opened at $359.08 on Thursday. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $357.40 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $346.66. Accenture plc has a 52 week low of $278.69 and a 52 week high of $387.51. The stock has a market cap of $224.71 billion, a PE ratio of 30.12, a P/E/G ratio of 3.14 and a beta of 1.24. 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 (NYSE:ACN) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The company had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $3.27 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 9.0% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.69 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Investors of record on Thursday, January 16th will be paid a dividend of $1.48 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, January 16th. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.65%. Accenture’s payout ratio is 49.66%.

Accenture announced that its Board of Directors has initiated a share repurchase plan on Thursday, September 26th that authorizes the company to buyback $4.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the information technology services provider to purchase up to 1.8% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are usually an indication that the company’s board of directors believes its stock is undervalued.

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.