Dixon Mitchell Investment Counsel Inc. Acquires New Shares in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Dixon Mitchell Investment Counsel Inc. bought a new stake in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) during the 1st quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund bought 354 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $123,000.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Pin Oak Investment Advisors Inc. grew its stake in Accenture by 8.2% in the fourth quarter. Pin Oak Investment Advisors Inc. now owns 357 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $125,000 after purchasing an additional 27 shares during the last quarter. Brave Asset Management Inc. grew its stake in Accenture by 2.8% in the fourth quarter. Brave Asset Management Inc. now owns 1,028 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $361,000 after purchasing an additional 28 shares during the last quarter. Addison Advisors LLC grew its stake in Accenture by 0.9% in the fourth quarter. Addison Advisors LLC now owns 3,181 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,116,000 after purchasing an additional 28 shares during the last quarter. Searle & CO. grew its stake in Accenture by 3.6% in the fourth quarter. Searle & CO. now owns 803 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $282,000 after purchasing an additional 28 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Sound View Wealth Advisors Group LLC grew its stake in shares of Accenture by 2.1% during the fourth quarter. Sound View Wealth Advisors Group LLC now owns 1,363 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $478,000 after acquiring an additional 28 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE:ACN traded up $1.28 during midday trading on Tuesday, reaching $303.83. 2,177,166 shares of the company’s stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 2,907,553. Accenture plc has a 1 year low of $278.69 and a 1 year high of $387.51. The company has a market cap of $190.41 billion, a P/E ratio of 27.68, a PEG ratio of 3.38 and a beta of 1.23. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $299.86 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $335.76.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, June 20th. The information technology services provider reported $3.13 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.15 by ($0.02). Accenture had a net margin of 10.79% and a return on equity of 27.48%. The business had revenue of $16.47 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $16.55 billion. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $3.19 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was down .6% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, research analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 11.95 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, August 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, July 11th will be issued a $1.29 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, July 11th. This represents a $5.16 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.70%. Accenture’s payout ratio is currently 47.25%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts have recently weighed in on the company. Mizuho dropped their price target on Accenture from $398.00 to $350.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, June 18th. Redburn Atlantic boosted their price target on Accenture from $410.00 to $445.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, March 19th. BMO Capital Markets dropped their price target on Accenture from $375.00 to $350.00 and set a “market perform” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, June 21st. Citigroup dropped their price target on Accenture from $430.00 to $400.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, March 22nd. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus dropped their price target on Accenture from $395.00 to $340.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, June 12th. Twelve investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twelve have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $352.74.

Insider Buying and Selling at Accenture

In other Accenture news, CEO Jean-Marc Ollagnier sold 6,250 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, April 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $315.91, for a total value of $1,974,437.50. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 161,581 shares in the company, valued at approximately $51,045,053.71. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. In related news, insider Ellyn Shook sold 5,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, April 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $307.22, for a total transaction of $1,536,100.00. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 13,699 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,208,606.78. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CEO Jean-Marc Ollagnier sold 6,250 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, April 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $315.91, for a total value of $1,974,437.50. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 161,581 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $51,045,053.71. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders have sold 20,083 shares of company stock worth $6,302,285. Corporate insiders own 0.07% 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.