Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Shares Bought by Knights of Columbus Asset Advisors LLC

Knights of Columbus Asset Advisors LLC grew its stake in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 25.0% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 16,894 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after buying an additional 3,383 shares during the quarter. Knights of Columbus Asset Advisors LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $5,943,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the company. Morse Asset Management Inc purchased a new stake in Accenture during the 3rd quarter worth approximately $25,000. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. lifted its holdings in Accenture by 62.2% in the fourth quarter. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. now owns 73 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $28,000 after acquiring an additional 28 shares during the last quarter. Kohmann Bosshard Financial Services LLC acquired a new position in Accenture in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $30,000. POM Investment Strategies LLC lifted its stake in Accenture by 64.2% during the fourth quarter. POM Investment Strategies LLC now owns 87 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $31,000 after purchasing an additional 34 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Retirement Wealth Solutions LLC acquired a new position in Accenture during the fourth quarter worth $34,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Trading Up 1.4 %

ACN opened at $305.17 on Friday. 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 has a market cap of $190.97 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.60, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $359.16 and a 200 day simple moving average of $357.13. Accenture plc has a fifty-two week low of $278.69 and a fifty-two week high of $398.35.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.81 by $0.01. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The business had revenue of $16.70 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $16.64 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $2.77 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue was up 5.7% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, April 10th will be given a dividend of $1.48 per share. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.94%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 10th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is 49.66%.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

ACN has been the topic of several analyst reports. Baird R W upgraded Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Monday, March 17th. Mizuho dropped their price objective on Accenture from $428.00 to $398.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday. Morgan Stanley decreased their target price on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $372.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, March 17th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their target price on shares of Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, December 16th. Finally, Wolfe Research upgraded shares of Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price objective for the company in a research report on Wednesday, January 8th. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $380.05.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Accenture news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $394.47, for a total transaction of $3,468,574.71. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 11,858 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,677,625.26. This trade represents a 42.58 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 232 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction on Wednesday, February 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $394.46, for a total transaction of $91,514.72. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 8,915 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,516,610.90. This represents a 2.54 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 22,280 shares of company stock worth $8,316,190 over the last ninety days. Corporate insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

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.