Diversified Portfolios Inc. Raises Stake in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Diversified Portfolios Inc. boosted its holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 1.6% during the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The institutional investor owned 1,882 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 30 shares during the quarter. Diversified Portfolios Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $662,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Morse Asset Management Inc purchased a new position in shares of Accenture in the 3rd quarter valued at $25,000. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. purchased a new position in Accenture in the third quarter valued at about $30,000. POM Investment Strategies LLC lifted its stake in shares of 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. Retirement Wealth Solutions LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Accenture in the fourth quarter worth about $34,000. Finally, Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of Accenture by 607.1% during the 3rd quarter. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC now owns 99 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $35,000 after buying an additional 85 shares during the period. 75.14% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several analysts have issued reports on the stock. Piper Sandler increased their price objective on shares of Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Morgan Stanley raised their price target on shares of Accenture from $335.00 to $380.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, January 31st. StockNews.com upgraded shares of Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, January 13th. UBS Group lifted their target price on 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 reduced their price target on Accenture from $385.00 to $355.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, January 21st. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, Accenture has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $387.22.

Accenture Stock Up 0.9 %

Accenture stock opened at $390.21 on Wednesday. The firm has a market capitalization of $244.19 billion, a P/E ratio of 32.74, a P/E/G ratio of 3.44 and a beta of 1.24. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $363.57 and a 200-day simple moving average of $353.18. Accenture plc has a one year low of $278.69 and a one year high of $398.35. 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 (NYSE:ACN) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The company had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $3.27 earnings per share. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities analysts expect 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 Friday, February 14th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be issued a dividend of $1.48 per share. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.52%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, January 16th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 49.66%.

Insider Activity at Accenture

In other news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $394.47, for a total value of $3,468,574.71. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 11,858 shares in the company, valued at $4,677,625.26. This represents a 42.58 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 232 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $394.46, for a total value of $91,514.72. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 8,915 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,516,610.90. The trade was a 2.54 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 22,280 shares of company stock worth $8,316,190 over the last ninety days. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

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.