First Trust Advisors LP Sells 74,436 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

First Trust Advisors LP cut its stake in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 7.6% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 898,880 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 74,436 shares during the period. First Trust Advisors LP’s holdings in Accenture were worth $316,217,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Several other hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the stock. Forum Financial Management LP increased its stake in shares of Accenture by 2.8% in the 4th quarter. Forum Financial Management LP now owns 4,646 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,634,000 after buying an additional 127 shares during the period. GeoWealth Management LLC boosted its holdings in Accenture by 2.9% in the fourth quarter. GeoWealth Management LLC now owns 7,373 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $2,594,000 after acquiring an additional 210 shares during the last quarter. Capital International Ltd. CA increased its position in Accenture by 5.6% in the fourth quarter. Capital International Ltd. CA now owns 6,235 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $2,193,000 after purchasing an additional 329 shares during the period. Commerce Bank lifted its position in Accenture by 2.3% during the 4th quarter. Commerce Bank now owns 49,016 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $17,243,000 after purchasing an additional 1,100 shares during the period. Finally, Capital International Investors boosted its stake in shares of Accenture by 2.2% in the 4th quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 8,513,140 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $2,994,922,000 after purchasing an additional 181,449 shares during the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities analysts recently weighed in on ACN shares. Stifel Nicolaus cut their price objective on shares of Accenture from $390.00 to $380.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, February 26th. Piper Sandler reduced their price target on Accenture from $364.00 to $355.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday. Barclays dropped their price objective on Accenture from $415.00 to $390.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Monday, March 24th. Guggenheim reduced their target price on Accenture from $400.00 to $395.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, March 21st. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group lowered their price target on Accenture from $385.00 to $355.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, January 21st. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $377.82.

Accenture Stock Performance

Shares of Accenture stock opened at $282.28 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 firm has a market cap of $176.80 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 23.68, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.32. Accenture plc has a one year low of $275.01 and a one year high of $398.35. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $326.22 and its 200-day moving average is $349.73.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 earnings per share 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 firm had revenue of $16.70 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $16.64 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $2.77 EPS. The business’s revenue was up 5.7% on a year-over-year basis. Equities analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Shareholders 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 yield of 2.10%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 48.89%.

Insider Transactions at Accenture

In other news, General Counsel Joel Unruch sold 3,563 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, April 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $281.78, for a total transaction of $1,003,982.14. Following the sale, the general counsel now owns 17,237 shares in the company, valued at $4,857,041.86. This represents a 17.13 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 169 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, April 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $281.90, for a total transaction of $47,641.10. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 5,364 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,512,111.60. This represents a 3.05 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 23,778 shares of company stock worth $8,408,087 in the last three months. Insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

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.