United Asset Strategies Inc. Acquires 233 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

United Asset Strategies Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 5.8% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 4,245 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after buying an additional 233 shares during the quarter. United Asset Strategies Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $1,493,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of the business. Schrum Private Wealth Management LLC boosted its holdings in Accenture by 78.6% in the 3rd quarter. Schrum Private Wealth Management LLC now owns 11,448 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $4,047,000 after purchasing an additional 5,038 shares during the period. MQS Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Accenture during the third quarter valued at about $1,040,000. Concurrent Investment Advisors LLC lifted its stake in shares of Accenture by 70.6% in the third quarter. Concurrent Investment Advisors LLC now owns 35,591 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $12,581,000 after buying an additional 14,724 shares during the period. M&G PLC increased its stake in Accenture by 34.1% during the third quarter. M&G PLC now owns 292,808 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $103,361,000 after acquiring an additional 74,438 shares during the period. Finally, Radnor Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in Accenture by 21.6% in the 3rd quarter. Radnor Capital Management LLC now owns 22,131 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $7,823,000 after acquiring an additional 3,930 shares in the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Accenture news, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the company’s 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 sale, the chief executive officer now owns 6 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,062.20. The trade was a 99.81 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 2,497 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, January 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.48, for a total value of $885,136.56. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 28,866 shares in the company, valued at $10,232,419.68. This represents a 7.96 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 9,196 shares of company stock valued at $3,226,918 over the last ninety days. Insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

ACN has been the subject of a number of recent research reports. BNP Paribas lowered Accenture from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $375.00 target price for the company. in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price objective on shares of Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, December 16th. The Goldman Sachs Group upgraded shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their target price for the company from $370.00 to $420.00 in a research report on Friday, December 6th. UBS Group increased their price target on shares of Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, December 20th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group decreased their price objective on Accenture from $385.00 to $355.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, January 21st. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Accenture currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $383.74.

Accenture Price Performance

ACN opened at $362.65 on Monday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.47. The company’s 50 day simple moving average is $357.37 and its 200-day simple moving average is $348.01. Accenture plc has a one year low of $278.69 and a one year high of $387.51. The stock has a market capitalization of $226.94 billion, a P/E ratio of 30.42, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.20 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last released its earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. The company had revenue of $17.69 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $17.15 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm earned $3.27 EPS. Sell-side analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 12.69 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be given a dividend of $1.48 per share. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.63%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, January 16th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is 49.66%.

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.