Park Place Capital Corp Lowers Stock Position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Park Place Capital Corp lowered its position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 11.2% in the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 2,879 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 362 shares during the period. Park Place Capital Corp’s holdings in Accenture were worth $1,018,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in ACN. BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp increased its holdings in Accenture by 18.7% during the second quarter. BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp now owns 172,199 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $52,247,000 after buying an additional 27,168 shares during the last quarter. New Mexico Educational Retirement Board increased its holdings in Accenture by 11.9% during the first quarter. New Mexico Educational Retirement Board now owns 36,750 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $12,393,000 after buying an additional 3,900 shares during the last quarter. Allspring Global Investments Holdings LLC increased its holdings in Accenture by 13.3% during the first quarter. Allspring Global Investments Holdings LLC now owns 183,446 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $63,584,000 after buying an additional 21,516 shares during the last quarter. M&G Plc purchased a new stake in Accenture during the first quarter worth about $19,007,000. Finally, First Long Island Investors LLC increased its holdings in Accenture by 27.8% during the first quarter. First Long Island Investors LLC now owns 65,717 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $22,778,000 after buying an additional 14,283 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Stock Performance

Accenture stock traded up $2.26 during mid-day trading on Tuesday, hitting $359.06. 458,045 shares of the company traded hands, compared to its average volume of 2,756,207. Accenture plc has a one year low of $278.69 and a one year high of $387.51. The stock has a market cap of $225.02 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 32.82, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.69 and a beta of 1.25. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $337.24 and a 200-day moving average price of $319.79.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, September 26th. The information technology services provider reported $2.79 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.78 by $0.01. Accenture had a net margin of 10.79% and a return on equity of 27.48%. The business had revenue of $16.41 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $16.37 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $2.71 earnings per share. Accenture’s revenue for the quarter was up 2.6% on a year-over-year basis. Sell-side analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 11.95 EPS for the current year.

Accenture declared that its Board of Directors has approved a stock repurchase program on Thursday, September 26th that permits the company to repurchase $4.00 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization permits the information technology services provider to repurchase up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are usually an indication that the company’s leadership believes its shares are undervalued.

Accenture Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, November 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, October 10th will be given a dividend of $1.48 per share. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, October 10th. This is a positive change from Accenture’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.29. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.65%. Accenture’s payout ratio is presently 54.21%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Accenture

In other Accenture news, CFO Kathleen R. Mcclure sold 3,000 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, July 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $309.22, for a total transaction of $927,660.00. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 40,070 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $12,390,445.40. This trade represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. In other Accenture news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 3,776 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, July 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $309.05, for a total transaction of $1,166,972.80. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 11,819 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,652,661.95. This trade represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CFO Kathleen R. Mcclure sold 3,000 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction on Friday, July 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $309.22, for a total transaction of $927,660.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 40,070 shares in the company, valued at approximately $12,390,445.40. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 21,421 shares of company stock worth $6,912,635 over the last three months. 0.07% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of analysts recently issued reports on the stock. Susquehanna raised their price objective on shares of Accenture from $350.00 to $360.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. BMO Capital Markets increased their target price on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $390.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. Piper Sandler Companies reiterated a “neutral” rating and set a $329.00 target price on shares of Accenture in a research report on Friday, September 20th. Mizuho increased their target price on shares of Accenture from $352.00 to $365.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, September 18th. Finally, Piper Sandler upgraded shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and increased their target price for the stock from $329.00 to $395.00 in a research report on Thursday, September 26th. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $371.18.

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.