Douglass Winthrop Advisors LLC Purchases 3,735 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Douglass Winthrop Advisors LLC raised its holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 1.4% in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 262,276 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 3,735 shares during the period. Accenture comprises about 1.8% of Douglass Winthrop Advisors LLC’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 26th largest holding. Douglass Winthrop Advisors LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $92,709,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other large investors also recently modified their holdings of the company. Swedbank AB bought a new position in Accenture in the first quarter valued at approximately $820,912,000. Clearbridge Investments LLC raised its holdings in shares of Accenture by 44.7% during the second quarter. Clearbridge Investments LLC now owns 2,709,989 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $822,238,000 after acquiring an additional 837,677 shares during the period. 1832 Asset Management L.P. lifted its position in Accenture by 251.3% in the 2nd quarter. 1832 Asset Management L.P. now owns 995,896 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $302,165,000 after acquiring an additional 712,400 shares in the last quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC increased its holdings in Accenture by 37,788.5% during the 3rd quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 510,358 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $180,401,000 after purchasing an additional 509,011 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Renaissance Technologies LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Accenture in the 2nd quarter valued at about $125,126,000. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

ACN has been the subject of several recent research reports. Bank of America upped their price objective on Accenture from $365.00 to $388.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. Piper Sandler raised Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and lifted their target price for the company from $329.00 to $395.00 in a research report on Thursday, September 26th. Guggenheim lifted their target price on Accenture from $380.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. Barclays lifted their target price on Accenture from $350.00 to $415.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, September 30th. Finally, BMO Capital Markets raised their price objective on Accenture from $380.00 to $390.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. Ten investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $368.23.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 9,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, October 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $376.16, for a total value of $3,385,440.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 20,324 shares in the company, valued at approximately $7,645,075.84. This trade represents a 30.69 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $343.70, for a total value of $1,096,746.70. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 6 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,062.20. This trade represents a 99.81 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over 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 company insiders.

Accenture Stock Performance

Shares of ACN opened at $358.66 on Monday. The firm has a market cap of $224.22 billion, a P/E ratio of 31.38, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.16 and a beta of 1.25. Accenture plc has a 52 week low of $278.69 and a 52 week high of $387.51. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $356.42 and its 200 day simple moving average is $329.23.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, September 26th. The information technology services provider reported $2.79 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.78 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $16.41 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $16.37 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.83% and a net margin of 11.20%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 2.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $2.71 earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.77 earnings per share for the current year.

Accenture Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, October 10th were paid a $1.48 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, October 10th. This is an increase from Accenture’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.29. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.65%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is 51.79%.

Accenture declared that its board has approved a share buyback plan 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 shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are typically an indication that the company’s leadership believes its shares are undervalued.

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.