Accenture (NYSE:ACN) Shares Gap Up Following Better-Than-Expected Earnings

Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) gapped up before the market opened on Thursday after the company announced better than expected quarterly earnings. The stock had previously closed at $347.61, but opened at $365.00. Accenture shares last traded at $369.88, with a volume of 1,292,143 shares.

The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.83% and a net margin of 11.20%. The company had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $3.27 earnings per share. Accenture’s revenue was up 9.0% on a year-over-year basis.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be paid a $1.48 dividend. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.60%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 51.79%.

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

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of analysts have recently issued reports on ACN shares. BNP Paribas cut shares of Accenture from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $375.00 price objective for the company. in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Piper Sandler Companies reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and issued a $329.00 price objective on shares of Accenture in a research note on Friday, September 20th. The Goldman Sachs Group raised Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and boosted their target price for the company from $370.00 to $420.00 in a research report on Friday, December 6th. UBS Group raised their price target on Accenture from $400.00 to $415.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. Finally, Mizuho boosted their price objective on shares of Accenture from $352.00 to $365.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, September 18th. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have issued a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $374.50.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Accenture news, COO John F. Walsh sold 5,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $373.24, for a total transaction of $1,866,200.00. Following the transaction, the chief operating officer now directly owns 17,593 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $6,566,411.32. This trade represents a 22.13 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $343.70, for a total transaction of $1,096,746.70. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 6 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,062.20. This represents a 99.81 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders have sold 36,298 shares of company stock worth $13,372,661. 0.07% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Accenture

Several large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Morse Asset Management Inc acquired a new stake in Accenture in the 3rd quarter valued at about $25,000. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Accenture in the third quarter valued at approximately $30,000. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC lifted its position in Accenture by 607.1% during the third quarter. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC now owns 99 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $35,000 after buying an additional 85 shares in the last quarter. RPg Family Wealth Advisory LLC acquired a new position in Accenture during the third quarter worth $39,000. Finally, Reston Wealth Management LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Accenture in the 3rd quarter worth $51,000. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Accenture Trading Up 6.2 %

The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $360.14 and a 200 day moving average price of $336.31. The firm has a market cap of $230.70 billion, a PE ratio of 32.29, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24.

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.