Stifel Nicolaus Issues Pessimistic Forecast for Accenture (NYSE:ACN) Stock Price

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) had its target price reduced by equities research analysts at Stifel Nicolaus from $390.00 to $380.00 in a report released on Wednesday,Benzinga reports. The firm currently has a “buy” rating on the information technology services provider’s stock. Stifel Nicolaus’ price objective indicates a potential upside of 4.97% from the company’s current price.

Several other equities analysts also recently weighed in on ACN. Wolfe Research raised Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 target price for the company in a research report on Wednesday, January 8th. BNP Paribas downgraded shares of Accenture from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $375.00 target price on the stock. in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Piper Sandler lifted their price target on Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, December 19th. UBS Group increased their price objective on Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group raised Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their price target for the company from $370.00 to $420.00 in a report on Friday, December 6th. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $388.96.

Accenture Stock Down 0.5 %

Shares of ACN opened at $362.02 on Wednesday. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $367.73 and a 200 day moving average price of $357.32. The stock has a market capitalization of $226.55 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.36, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a current ratio of 1.47. Accenture has a one year low of $278.69 and a one year high of $398.35.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last released 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. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The firm had revenue of $17.69 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $17.15 billion. During the same period last year, the business earned $3.27 earnings per share. Accenture’s revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities research analysts forecast that Accenture will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Accenture

In other news, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total transaction of $134,437.50. Following the sale, the insider now owns 5,149 shares in the company, valued at $1,845,916.50. This trade represents a 6.79 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, CFO Angie Y. Park sold 685 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, January 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $354.38, for a total transaction of $242,750.30. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 8,674 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,073,892.12. This trade represents a 7.32 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 22,280 shares of company stock valued at $8,316,190 over the last three months. 0.02% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Trading of Accenture

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Baldwin Wealth Partners LLC MA increased its holdings in shares of Accenture by 6.5% in the 4th quarter. Baldwin Wealth Partners LLC MA now owns 63,429 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $22,314,000 after acquiring an additional 3,883 shares during the period. Davidson Trust Co. boosted its position in shares of Accenture by 7.4% during the fourth quarter. Davidson Trust Co. now owns 2,307 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $812,000 after buying an additional 158 shares during the period. Schrum Private Wealth Management LLC grew its stake in shares of Accenture by 78.6% in the third quarter. Schrum Private Wealth Management LLC now owns 11,448 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $4,047,000 after purchasing an additional 5,038 shares in the last quarter. MQS Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Accenture during the third quarter valued at approximately $1,040,000. Finally, Concurrent Investment Advisors LLC raised its stake in shares of Accenture by 70.6% in the 3rd quarter. Concurrent Investment Advisors LLC now owns 35,591 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $12,581,000 after buying an additional 14,724 shares in the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

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.