Fulton Bank N.A. Buys 868 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Fulton Bank N.A. increased its holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 7.4% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 12,655 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 868 shares during the quarter. Fulton Bank N.A.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $4,452,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

A number of other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. State Street Corp increased its position in shares of Accenture by 1.8% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 27,400,836 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $9,685,648,000 after acquiring an additional 471,792 shares in the last quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA lifted its stake in shares of Accenture by 1.2% in 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 purchasing an additional 131,544 shares during the period. Legal & General Group Plc grew its holdings in Accenture by 1.4% during the second quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 5,887,266 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,786,256,000 after purchasing an additional 80,514 shares during the period. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC raised its holdings in Accenture by 378.9% during the third 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 valued at $1,941,219,000 after acquiring an additional 4,345,039 shares during the period. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Accenture by 1.2% in the third 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 in the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Accenture Trading Up 0.5 %

Shares of Accenture stock traded up $1.61 during trading hours on Wednesday, reaching $358.00. The stock had a trading volume of 815,080 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,417,782. The firm has a market capitalization of $224.03 billion, a PE ratio of 31.32, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. Accenture plc has a twelve month low of $278.69 and a twelve month high of $387.51. The stock’s 50 day moving average is $357.26 and its 200 day moving average is $343.27.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a net margin of 11.20% and a return on equity of 26.83%. The business had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $3.27 earnings per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 12.74 earnings per share for the current year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be issued a $1.48 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, January 16th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.65%. Accenture’s payout ratio is currently 49.66%.

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 outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the information technology services provider to reacquire up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are typically a sign that the company’s board of directors believes its stock is undervalued.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

ACN has been the subject of a number of recent research reports. TD Cowen raised shares of Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and raised their target price for the company from $321.00 to $400.00 in a report on Monday, September 30th. BMO Capital Markets boosted their price objective on shares of Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, December 20th. BNP Paribas lowered Accenture from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $375.00 price target on the stock. in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Robert W. Baird reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and set a $370.00 target price on shares of Accenture in a research report on Tuesday, December 3rd. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada lifted their price objective on shares of 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 fifteen have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $385.04.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CFO Kathleen R. Mcclure sold 5,090 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, October 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $373.22, for a total value of $1,899,689.80. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 38,825 shares in the company, valued at $14,490,266.50. This represents a 11.59 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, COO John F. Walsh sold 5,000 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, October 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $373.24, for a total value of $1,866,200.00. Following the transaction, the chief operating officer now owns 17,593 shares in the company, valued at approximately $6,566,411.32. The trade was a 22.13 % decrease in their position. 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 90 days. 0.02% of the stock is owned by insiders.

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.