Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Given Average Rating of “Moderate Buy” by Brokerages

Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) have earned an average rating of “Moderate Buy” from the twenty-three research firms that are currently covering the company, MarketBeat Ratings reports. Seven investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. The average 12-month price objective among brokers that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is $378.91.

ACN has been the subject of several recent research reports. Royal Bank of Canada reduced their price target on Accenture from $399.00 to $392.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Friday. UBS Group dropped their price target on Accenture from $455.00 to $387.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Friday. Guggenheim decreased their price target on shares of Accenture from $400.00 to $395.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday. Morgan Stanley cut their price objective on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $372.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Monday, March 17th. Finally, Baird R W upgraded Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Monday, March 17th.

Accenture Price Performance

NYSE ACN opened at $307.24 on Tuesday. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $358.32 and its 200 day moving average price is $357.10. Accenture has a 1 year low of $278.69 and a 1 year high of $398.35. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.47. The company has a market cap of $192.27 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.78, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 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 analysts’ expectations of $16.64 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $2.77 EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 5.7% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Accenture will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, April 10th will be paid a $1.48 dividend. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.93%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 10th. Accenture’s payout ratio is 48.89%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Accenture news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 2,497 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.48, for a total transaction of $885,136.56. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 28,866 shares in the company, valued at $10,232,419.68. This represents a 7.96 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 1,487 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, January 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.54, for a total value of $527,200.98. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 9,247 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,278,431.38. This represents a 13.85 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 21,905 shares of company stock valued at $8,181,753 in the last ninety days. Company insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Accenture

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of ACN. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its stake in Accenture by 0.7% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 60,394,657 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $21,246,236,000 after buying an additional 392,183 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp raised its position in shares of Accenture by 1.8% during the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 27,400,836 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $9,685,648,000 after acquiring an additional 471,792 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its stake in Accenture by 1.0% during the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 13,528,348 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $4,750,021,000 after purchasing an additional 136,665 shares during the last quarter. Capital Research Global Investors raised its holdings in Accenture by 16.8% during the fourth quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 12,295,748 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $4,325,526,000 after purchasing an additional 1,770,024 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Wellington Management Group LLP lifted its position in shares of Accenture by 22.8% during the 4th quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 12,175,518 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $4,283,225,000 after buying an additional 2,260,740 shares during the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

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.