UBS Group Cuts Accenture (NYSE:ACN) Price Target to $387.00

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) had its target price trimmed by UBS Group from $455.00 to $387.00 in a research report released on Friday morning,Benzinga reports. The firm currently has a buy rating on the information technology services provider’s stock.

Several other equities research analysts also recently issued reports on ACN. Mizuho decreased their price target on Accenture from $428.00 to $398.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, March 19th. StockNews.com downgraded shares of Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Tuesday, March 11th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their price target on shares of Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, December 16th. Wolfe Research raised shares of Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 target price on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, January 8th. Finally, Baird R W raised Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Monday, March 17th. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, Accenture presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $380.05.

Accenture Stock Performance

Shares of Accenture stock opened at $305.17 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $190.97 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.60, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. Accenture has a one year low of $278.69 and a one year high of $398.35. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of $359.16 and a 200 day simple moving average of $357.33. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.47.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.81 by $0.01. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The business had revenue of $16.70 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $16.64 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $2.77 EPS. Accenture’s revenue was up 5.7% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, research analysts anticipate that Accenture will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, April 10th will be issued a dividend of $1.48 per share. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, April 10th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.94%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 49.66%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Accenture

In related news, insider Angela Beatty sold 961 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, January 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.47, for a total value of $340,645.67. Following the sale, the insider now owns 5,484 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,943,913.48. This trade represents a 14.91 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated 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 transaction, 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 disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 21,905 shares of company stock valued at $8,181,753 in the last quarter. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of ACN. Morse Asset Management Inc bought a new position in shares of Accenture in the 3rd quarter worth $25,000. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. increased 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 last quarter. Kohmann Bosshard Financial Services LLC bought a new stake in Accenture during the fourth quarter worth about $30,000. Mpwm Advisory Solutions LLC bought a new position in shares of Accenture during the 4th quarter valued at about $30,000. Finally, POM Investment Strategies LLC raised its holdings in shares of Accenture by 64.2% during the 4th 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 in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

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.