Cooper Financial Group Has $582,000 Stock Position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Cooper Financial Group increased its position in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 86.8% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 1,655 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 769 shares during the quarter. Cooper Financial Group’s holdings in Accenture were worth $582,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Morse Asset Management Inc purchased a new stake in shares of Accenture in the third quarter valued at $25,000. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. acquired a new position in Accenture during the third quarter valued at $30,000. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC lifted its stake in Accenture by 607.1% in the 3rd quarter. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC now owns 99 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $35,000 after acquiring an additional 85 shares in the last quarter. RPg Family Wealth Advisory LLC purchased a new position in Accenture during the 3rd quarter valued at about $39,000. Finally, Reston Wealth Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Accenture in the 3rd quarter valued at about $51,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research analysts recently commented on ACN shares. Mizuho boosted their price objective on shares of Accenture from $352.00 to $365.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, September 18th. Piper Sandler upped their price target on shares of Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. BMO Capital Markets lifted their price objective on Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, December 20th. StockNews.com raised Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada boosted their price target on Accenture from $377.00 to $389.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, September 27th. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, Accenture currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $385.04.

Insider Activity

In related news, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $343.70, for a total transaction of $1,096,746.70. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 6 shares in the company, valued at $2,062.20. This trade represents a 99.81 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 9,000 shares of the 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 of the company’s stock, valued at $7,645,075.84. This represents a 30.69 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders have sold 36,673 shares of company stock worth $13,507,099. Company insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Stock Down 0.2 %

Shares of ACN stock opened at $349.14 on Tuesday. The stock has a 50 day moving average of $357.93 and a 200-day moving average of $344.63. The firm has a market cap of $218.49 billion, a PE ratio of 30.55, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. Accenture plc has a 12 month low of $278.69 and a 12 month high of $387.51.

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

Accenture Announces Dividend

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 given a $1.48 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, January 16th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.70%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is currently 49.66%.

Accenture declared that its Board of Directors has initiated a stock repurchase plan on Thursday, September 26th that permits the company to buyback $4.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization permits the information technology services provider to purchase up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback plans are often a sign that the company’s leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

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.