Summit Financial LLC Grows Stake in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Summit Financial LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 1.0% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 9,323 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 89 shares during the quarter. Summit Financial LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $3,271,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of the company. Chilton Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of Accenture by 180.0% during the fourth quarter. Chilton Capital Management LLC now owns 70 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $25,000 after buying an additional 45 shares during the last quarter. DiNuzzo Private Wealth Inc. bought a new stake in Accenture during the fourth quarter worth approximately $27,000. BluePath Capital Management LLC bought a new stake in Accenture during the third quarter worth approximately $31,000. Halpern Financial Inc. bought a new stake in Accenture during the fourth quarter worth approximately $31,000. Finally, Valued Wealth Advisors LLC bought a new stake in Accenture during the fourth quarter worth approximately $50,000. 75.14% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Accenture news, CEO Manish Sharma sold 1,486 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, February 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $370.39, for a total transaction of $550,399.54. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 4,503 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,667,866.17. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. In other news, CEO Jean-Marc Ollagnier sold 6,250 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, April 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $315.91, for a total transaction of $1,974,437.50. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 161,581 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $51,045,053.71. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CEO Manish Sharma sold 1,486 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $370.39, for a total transaction of $550,399.54. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 4,503 shares in the company, valued at $1,667,866.17. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders have sold 31,639 shares of company stock valued at $10,276,287. 0.07% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities research analysts recently commented on ACN shares. StockNews.com cut Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Saturday. Piper Sandler upped their price target on Accenture from $335.00 to $394.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Monday, March 18th. BNP Paribas raised Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $440.00 price target on the stock in a report on Wednesday, January 17th. Stifel Nicolaus upped their price target on Accenture from $363.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, March 18th. Finally, Redburn Atlantic upped their price target on Accenture from $410.00 to $445.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, March 19th. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $387.00.

Accenture Trading Down 0.8 %

Accenture stock traded down $2.35 on Wednesday, reaching $298.56. 2,617,150 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 2,497,852. The stock has a market cap of $200.26 billion, a PE ratio of 27.14, a PEG ratio of 2.87 and a beta of 1.19. Accenture plc has a twelve month low of $261.68 and a twelve month high of $387.51. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $347.09 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $342.34.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, March 21st. The information technology services provider reported $2.77 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.66 by $0.11. The business had revenue of $15.80 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $15.85 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 10.89% and a return on equity of 28.30%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was down .1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $2.69 earnings per share. Equities analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 12.09 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, May 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, April 11th will be paid a $1.29 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, April 10th. This represents a $5.16 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.73%. Accenture’s payout ratio is currently 46.78%.

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.