Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Shares Sold by United Asset Strategies Inc.

United Asset Strategies Inc. lowered its stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 56.6% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 3,173 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 4,136 shares during the quarter. United Asset Strategies Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $1,113,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Several other large investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in ACN. Norges Bank bought a new position in Accenture during the fourth quarter worth $1,850,765,000. Moneta Group Investment Advisors LLC lifted its stake in Accenture by 101,214.0% during the fourth quarter. Moneta Group Investment Advisors LLC now owns 4,040,402 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,078,141,000 after purchasing an additional 4,036,414 shares during the last quarter. Morgan Stanley lifted its stake in Accenture by 14.9% during the fourth quarter. Morgan Stanley now owns 16,642,841 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $4,440,976,000 after purchasing an additional 2,163,582 shares during the last quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP lifted its stake in Accenture by 7.0% during the third quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 11,034,666 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $3,388,856,000 after purchasing an additional 720,647 shares during the last quarter. Finally, State Street Corp lifted its stake in Accenture by 2.7% during the first quarter. State Street Corp now owns 26,453,884 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $7,560,765,000 after purchasing an additional 704,657 shares during the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities research analysts have issued reports on ACN shares. TD Cowen cut their target price on Accenture from $363.00 to $350.00 and set a “market perform” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, March 22nd. Robert W. Baird raised their target price on Accenture from $364.00 to $375.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, March 7th. StockNews.com cut Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Friday, March 22nd. Citigroup cut their target price on Accenture from $430.00 to $400.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, March 22nd. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus raised their target price on Accenture from $363.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, March 18th. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $387.00.

Accenture Stock Up 0.2 %

NYSE:ACN opened at $313.94 on Wednesday. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $358.39 and its 200 day moving average price is $342.14. The firm has a market cap of $210.57 billion, a P/E ratio of 28.46, a PEG ratio of 2.99 and a beta of 1.19. Accenture plc has a 52-week low of $261.68 and a 52-week high of $387.51.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, March 21st. The information technology services provider reported $2.77 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.66 by $0.11. The firm had revenue of $15.80 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $15.85 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 28.30% and a net margin of 10.89%. Accenture’s revenue was down .1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $2.69 EPS. Sell-side analysts expect that Accenture plc will post 12.09 EPS for the current year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, May 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, April 11th will be paid a $1.29 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, April 10th. This represents a $5.16 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.64%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is currently 46.78%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO Jean-Marc Ollagnier sold 6,250 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $362.77, for a total value of $2,267,312.50. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 167,831 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $60,884,051.87. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. In other Accenture news, CEO Jean-Marc Ollagnier sold 6,250 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $362.77, for a total transaction of $2,267,312.50. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 167,831 shares in the company, valued at approximately $60,884,051.87. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, insider Ellyn Shook sold 5,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $371.81, for a total value of $1,859,050.00. Following the sale, the insider now owns 20,316 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $7,553,691.96. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders have sold 31,000 shares of company stock valued at $11,146,998. 0.07% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

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.