Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Short Interest Down 5.9% in March

Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) was the target of a large drop in short interest in the month of March. As of March 31st, there was short interest totalling 7,070,000 shares, a drop of 5.9% from the March 15th total of 7,510,000 shares. Based on an average trading volume of 2,310,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 3.1 days. Approximately 1.1% of the shares of the company are short sold.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, COO John F. Walsh sold 8,000 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, March 25th. The shares were sold at an average price of $332.13, for a total value of $2,657,040.00. Following the sale, the chief operating officer now owns 17,877 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,937,488.01. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. In other news, CEO Jean-Marc Ollagnier sold 6,250 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, January 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $362.77, for a total value of $2,267,312.50. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 167,831 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $60,884,051.87. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, COO John F. Walsh sold 8,000 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, March 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $332.13, for a total transaction of $2,657,040.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief operating officer now directly owns 17,877 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,937,488.01. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 31,000 shares of company stock valued at $11,146,998 in the last quarter. Company insiders own 0.07% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Opinicus Capital Inc. acquired a new position in Accenture during the 1st quarter worth about $319,000. Avity Investment Management Inc. raised its holdings in Accenture by 6.8% during the 1st quarter. Avity Investment Management Inc. now owns 107,822 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $37,372,000 after purchasing an additional 6,884 shares during the last quarter. Webster Bank N. A. raised its holdings in Accenture by 8.6% during the 1st quarter. Webster Bank N. A. now owns 9,155 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $3,173,000 after purchasing an additional 724 shares during the last quarter. KRS Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in Accenture by 12.6% during the 1st quarter. KRS Capital Management LLC now owns 1,876 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $650,000 after purchasing an additional 210 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Astoria Portfolio Advisors LLC. raised its holdings in Accenture by 12.1% during the 1st quarter. Astoria Portfolio Advisors LLC. now owns 1,756 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $609,000 after purchasing an additional 189 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several brokerages have recently issued reports on ACN. Citigroup lowered their price objective on shares of Accenture from $430.00 to $400.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, March 22nd. Susquehanna reiterated a “neutral” rating and issued a $360.00 target price (down from $400.00) on shares of Accenture in a report on Thursday, March 21st. Robert W. Baird raised their target price on shares of Accenture from $364.00 to $375.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, March 7th. Piper Sandler raised their target price on shares of Accenture from $335.00 to $394.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Monday, March 18th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus raised their target price on shares of Accenture from $363.00 to $395.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, March 18th. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $387.00.

Accenture Stock Up 0.2 %

ACN traded up $0.67 during trading on Tuesday, reaching $313.94. 2,874,922 shares of the company’s stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 2,362,788. Accenture has a fifty-two week low of $261.68 and a fifty-two week high of $387.51. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $359.41 and a 200 day moving average price of $342.09. The company has a market capitalization of $210.57 billion, a P/E ratio of 28.41, a PEG ratio of 2.99 and a beta of 1.19.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, March 21st. The information technology services provider reported $2.77 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.66 by $0.11. Accenture had a net margin of 10.89% and a return on equity of 28.30%. The company had revenue of $15.80 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $15.85 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $2.69 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was down .1% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts forecast that Accenture will post 12.09 EPS for the current year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, May 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, April 11th will be given a dividend of $1.29 per share. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, April 10th. This represents a $5.16 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.64%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 46.78%.

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.