Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Shares Sold by Boston Family Office LLC

Boston Family Office LLC decreased its position in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 1.0% during the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 3,346 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 34 shares during the period. Boston Family Office LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $1,183,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Gamco Investors INC. ET AL acquired a new position in shares of Accenture in the first quarter valued at approximately $256,000. B. Riley Wealth Advisors Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Accenture by 31.4% in the first quarter. B. Riley Wealth Advisors Inc. now owns 11,570 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $4,010,000 after purchasing an additional 2,768 shares during the period. Creekmur Asset Management LLC increased its holdings in shares of Accenture by 108.0% in the first quarter. Creekmur Asset Management LLC now owns 104 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $36,000 after purchasing an additional 54 shares during the period. Coppell Advisory Solutions Corp. acquired a new position in shares of Accenture in the first quarter valued at approximately $1,784,000. Finally, Vista Investment Partners LLC boosted its stake in shares of Accenture by 0.3% in the first quarter. Vista Investment Partners LLC now owns 13,130 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $4,551,000 after buying an additional 39 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of analysts recently weighed in on the company. TD Cowen upgraded Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their price target for the company from $321.00 to $400.00 in a research note on Monday, September 30th. Bank of America lifted their price target on Accenture from $365.00 to $388.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, September 27th. Piper Sandler upgraded Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and lifted their price target for the company from $329.00 to $395.00 in a research note on Thursday, September 26th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. decreased their price target on Accenture from $376.00 to $370.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, September 24th. Finally, BNP Paribas downgraded Accenture from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $375.00 price target on the stock. in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Ten research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have given a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Accenture has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $368.23.

Accenture Stock Up 0.7 %

Shares of NYSE:ACN opened at $361.29 on Tuesday. Accenture plc has a 52-week low of $278.69 and a 52-week high of $387.51. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $356.57 and its 200-day simple moving average is $329.61. The company has a market capitalization of $225.86 billion, a P/E ratio of 31.61, a P/E/G ratio of 3.14 and a beta of 1.25.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last released its earnings results on Thursday, September 26th. The information technology services provider reported $2.79 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.78 by $0.01. The firm had revenue of $16.41 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $16.37 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.83% and a net margin of 11.20%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 2.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $2.71 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 12.77 earnings per share for the current year.

Accenture Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, October 10th were paid a $1.48 dividend. This is a positive change from Accenture’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.29. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.64%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, October 10th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is presently 51.79%.

Accenture announced that its Board of Directors has approved a stock buyback program on Thursday, September 26th that permits the company to buyback $4.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization permits the information technology services provider to repurchase up to 1.8% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are typically a sign that the company’s board of directors believes its stock is undervalued.

Insider Activity at Accenture

In other Accenture news, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $343.70, for a total transaction of $1,096,746.70. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 6 shares in the company, valued at $2,062.20. This represents a 99.81 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 9,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, October 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $376.16, for a total value of $3,385,440.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 20,324 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $7,645,075.84. This represents a 30.69 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders sold 36,298 shares of company stock worth $13,372,661. 0.07% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

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.