Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Shares Bought by Canandaigua National Trust Co of Florida

Canandaigua National Trust Co of Florida raised its holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 9.6% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The firm owned 627 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 55 shares during the quarter. Canandaigua National Trust Co of Florida’s holdings in Accenture were worth $221,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of the company. State Street Corp raised its stake in shares of Accenture by 1.8% during the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 27,400,836 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $9,685,648,000 after buying an additional 471,792 shares during the last quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA raised its stake in shares of Accenture by 1.2% during the 2nd quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 10,912,962 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $3,311,102,000 after buying an additional 131,544 shares during the last quarter. Legal & General Group Plc raised its stake in shares of Accenture by 1.4% during the 2nd quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 5,887,266 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,786,256,000 after buying an additional 80,514 shares during the last quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC raised its stake in shares of Accenture by 378.9% during the 3rd quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 5,491,736 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,941,219,000 after buying an additional 4,345,039 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. raised its stake in shares of Accenture by 1.2% during the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 4,823,754 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,705,100,000 after buying an additional 56,937 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research analysts have recently issued reports on the company. The Goldman Sachs Group raised Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their price target for the stock from $370.00 to $420.00 in a research note on Friday, December 6th. BMO Capital Markets lifted their price objective on Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, December 20th. Robert W. Baird reiterated a “neutral” rating and set a $370.00 price objective on shares of Accenture in a research report on Tuesday, December 3rd. Susquehanna lifted their price objective on Accenture from $350.00 to $360.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada lifted their price objective on Accenture from $377.00 to $389.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. Nine equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fourteen have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $383.23.

Accenture Price Performance

Accenture stock traded down $2.59 during midday trading on Monday, hitting $351.26. 2,349,285 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 1,981,934. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $357.59 and its 200-day moving average price is $342.62. The company has a market cap of $219.81 billion, a PE ratio of 30.73, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. Accenture plc has a fifty-two week low of $278.69 and a fifty-two week high of $387.51.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.83% and a net margin of 11.20%. The firm had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.15 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $3.27 EPS. Accenture’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.0% on a year-over-year basis. On average, analysts expect that Accenture plc will post 12.74 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be given a $1.48 dividend. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.69%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, January 16th. Accenture’s payout ratio is 49.66%.

Accenture declared that its Board of Directors has approved a share buyback program 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 repurchase up to 1.8% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are generally an indication that the company’s board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

Insider Buying and Selling at Accenture

In other news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 458 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, October 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $373.25, for a total value of $170,948.50. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 9,777 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,649,265.25. The trade was a 4.47 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on 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 sale, the chief executive officer now owns 6 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,062.20. This trade represents a 99.81 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 36,673 shares of company stock valued at $13,507,099 in the last three months. Corporate insiders own 0.02% 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.