Benchmark Investment Advisors LLC Takes $358,000 Position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Benchmark Investment Advisors LLC purchased a new position in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) during the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor purchased 1,018 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $358,000.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Morse Asset Management Inc acquired a new stake in shares of Accenture during the 3rd quarter valued at about $25,000. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. boosted its holdings in Accenture by 62.2% during the fourth quarter. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. now owns 73 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $28,000 after purchasing an additional 28 shares in the last quarter. Kohmann Bosshard Financial Services LLC bought a new stake in shares of Accenture in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $30,000. POM Investment Strategies LLC lifted its position in shares of Accenture by 64.2% during the 4th quarter. POM Investment Strategies LLC now owns 87 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $31,000 after buying an additional 34 shares during the period. Finally, Retirement Wealth Solutions LLC acquired a new stake in Accenture in the 4th quarter valued at $34,000. Institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Insider Activity at Accenture

In other 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 value of $3,468,574.71. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly 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 SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 1,487 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, January 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $354.54, for a total transaction of $527,200.98. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 9,247 shares in the company, valued at $3,278,431.38. This represents a 13.85 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 21,905 shares of company stock valued at $8,181,753 over the last three months. 0.02% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Accenture Trading Down 5.4 %

Shares of NYSE:ACN opened at $285.04 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $178.53 billion, a P/E ratio of 23.91, a P/E/G ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.32. 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 business’s 50 day simple moving average is $349.68 and its 200 day simple moving average is $354.55. Accenture plc has a 1 year low of $278.69 and a 1 year high of $398.35.

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

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The company 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. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 10th. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.08%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is 48.89%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts have recently commented on ACN shares. Stifel Nicolaus reduced their target price on shares of Accenture from $390.00 to $380.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, February 26th. Morgan Stanley reduced their price target on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $372.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, March 17th. UBS Group cut their target price on shares of Accenture from $455.00 to $387.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, March 21st. BMO Capital Markets increased their price target on Accenture to $355.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, March 26th. Finally, Baird R W upgraded Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Monday, March 17th. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $378.23.

About Accenture

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.