Insight Wealth Strategies LLC Increases Stake in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Insight Wealth Strategies LLC boosted its position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 2.5% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 10,598 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 260 shares during the quarter. Insight Wealth Strategies LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $3,728,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Private Advisor Group LLC increased its holdings in shares of Accenture by 16.8% in the 2nd quarter. Private Advisor Group LLC now owns 33,872 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $10,277,000 after acquiring an additional 4,881 shares during the last quarter. Cullen Frost Bankers Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Accenture by 6.5% in the 2nd quarter. Cullen Frost Bankers Inc. now owns 34,483 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $10,463,000 after buying an additional 2,092 shares in the last quarter. SRS Capital Advisors Inc. raised its stake in Accenture by 9.8% during the 2nd quarter. SRS Capital Advisors Inc. now owns 2,496 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $757,000 after acquiring an additional 223 shares in the last quarter. Umpqua Bank boosted its stake in Accenture by 1.6% in the second quarter. Umpqua Bank now owns 3,816 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,158,000 after acquiring an additional 61 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Strategic Financial Concepts LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Accenture in the 2nd quarter valued at about $28,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Trading Down 1.0 %

Shares of NYSE:ACN traded down $3.57 during midday trading on Monday, hitting $350.28. 811,349 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 1,687,557. Accenture plc has a twelve month low of $278.69 and a twelve month high of $387.51. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $357.59 and a 200-day moving average price of $342.62. The stock has a market cap of $219.20 billion, a P/E ratio of 30.65, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. The firm had revenue of $17.69 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $17.15 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.83% and a net margin of 11.20%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $3.27 EPS. On average, equities research analysts expect that Accenture plc will post 12.74 earnings per share for the current year.

Accenture declared that its Board of Directors has authorized a stock buyback program 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 repurchase up to 1.8% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are generally an indication that the company’s board of directors believes its stock is undervalued.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Investors of record on Thursday, January 16th will be given a dividend of $1.48 per share. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.69%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, January 16th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is presently 49.66%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Accenture

In other Accenture news, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, December 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total transaction of $134,437.50. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 5,149 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,845,916.50. This represents a 6.79 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 9,000 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction on Monday, October 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $376.16, for a total value of $3,385,440.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 20,324 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $7,645,075.84. This represents a 30.69 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last ninety days, insiders have sold 36,673 shares of company stock worth $13,507,099. Corporate insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of brokerages have weighed in on ACN. Mizuho boosted their price objective on Accenture from $352.00 to $365.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, September 18th. Bank of America raised their price objective on shares of Accenture from $365.00 to $388.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. BMO Capital Markets upped their target price 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. Citigroup raised their price target on Accenture from $350.00 to $405.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, September 17th. Finally, BNP Paribas cut Accenture from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $375.00 price objective for the company. in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Nine research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fourteen have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Accenture has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $383.23.

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.