Mizuho Lowers Accenture (NYSE:ACN) Price Target to $398.00

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) had its target price lowered by equities research analysts at Mizuho from $428.00 to $398.00 in a note issued to investors on Wednesday,Benzinga reports. The firm presently has an “outperform” rating on the information technology services provider’s stock. Mizuho’s price objective would indicate a potential upside of 32.29% from the stock’s current price.

ACN has been the subject of several other reports. Stifel Nicolaus dropped their price objective on Accenture from $390.00 to $380.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, February 26th. Jefferies Financial Group dropped their price objective on Accenture from $385.00 to $355.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, January 21st. Robert W. Baird upgraded Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $390.00 target price for the company in a research report on Monday. UBS Group increased their target price on Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, December 20th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their target price on Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, December 16th. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $384.45.

Accenture Stock Performance

ACN opened at $300.86 on Wednesday. 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 52-week low of $278.69 and a 52-week high of $398.35. The firm has a market cap of $188.28 billion, a P/E ratio of 25.24, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The business’s fifty day moving average is $360.05 and its 200-day moving average is $357.39.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.81 by $0.01. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The business had revenue of $16.70 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $16.64 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $2.77 EPS. Accenture’s revenue for the quarter was up 5.7% on a year-over-year basis. Sell-side analysts expect that Accenture will post 12.73 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 232 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $394.46, for a total transaction of $91,514.72. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 8,915 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,516,610.90. This trade represents a 2.54 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CFO Angie Y. Park sold 685 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, January 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.38, for a total value of $242,750.30. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 8,674 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,073,892.12. This represents a 7.32 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 22,280 shares of company stock valued at $8,316,190 over the last 90 days. Company insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Accenture

Hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Morse Asset Management Inc acquired a new stake in Accenture in the third quarter valued at approximately $25,000. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. grew its stake in Accenture by 62.2% in the fourth quarter. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. now owns 73 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $28,000 after acquiring an additional 28 shares during the period. Kohmann Bosshard Financial Services LLC acquired a new stake in Accenture in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $30,000. Mpwm Advisory Solutions LLC acquired a new stake in Accenture in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $30,000. Finally, POM Investment Strategies LLC boosted its position 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 valued at $31,000 after buying an additional 34 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

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.