BIP Wealth LLC Makes New Investment in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

BIP Wealth LLC bought a new position in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) during the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor bought 4,607 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $1,628,000.

Several other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in ACN. Unique Wealth Strategies LLC bought a new position in shares of Accenture in the second quarter worth $26,000. Strategic Financial Concepts LLC bought a new position in shares of Accenture in the second quarter worth $28,000. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. bought a new position in shares of Accenture in the third quarter worth $30,000. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC increased its holdings in shares of Accenture by 607.1% in the third quarter. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC now owns 99 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $35,000 after purchasing an additional 85 shares during the period. Finally, Creekmur Asset Management LLC increased its holdings in shares of Accenture by 108.0% in the 1st quarter. Creekmur Asset Management LLC now owns 104 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $36,000 after buying an additional 54 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several analysts have recently weighed in on ACN shares. Robert W. Baird raised their price objective on shares of Accenture from $350.00 to $370.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. Piper Sandler upgraded shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and raised their price objective for the company from $329.00 to $395.00 in a research report on Thursday, September 26th. Guggenheim raised their price objective on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. BMO Capital Markets lifted 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. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered their price target on shares of Accenture from $376.00 to $370.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, September 24th. Ten investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have given a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $368.23.

Accenture Stock Down 0.2 %

Shares of ACN opened at $352.79 on Tuesday. The business’s 50 day moving average price is $355.77 and its 200-day moving average price is $327.83. Accenture plc has a 52 week low of $278.69 and a 52 week high of $387.51. The stock has a market cap of $220.55 billion, a P/E ratio of 30.87, a P/E/G ratio of 3.09 and a beta of 1.25.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, September 26th. The information technology services provider reported $2.79 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.78 by $0.01. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.83% and a net margin of 11.20%. The firm had revenue of $16.41 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $16.37 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $2.71 EPS. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 2.6% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 12.77 EPS for the current year.

Accenture Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, October 10th were given a $1.48 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, October 10th. This is a boost from Accenture’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.29. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.68%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is 51.79%.

Accenture announced that its Board of Directors has authorized a share repurchase plan on Thursday, September 26th that authorizes the company to buyback $4.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the information technology services provider to purchase up to 1.8% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are often an indication that the company’s management believes its shares are undervalued.

Insider Activity at Accenture

In related news, CFO Kathleen R. Mcclure sold 5,090 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, October 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $373.22, for a total value of $1,899,689.80. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 38,825 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $14,490,266.50. This represents a 11.59 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 673 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, October 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $372.18, for a total value of $250,477.14. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 5,650 shares in the company, valued at $2,102,817. This trade represents a 10.64 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 36,298 shares of company stock valued at $13,372,661. 0.07% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

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.