Mount Yale Investment Advisors LLC Lowers Stock Position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Mount Yale Investment Advisors LLC lowered its holdings in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 20.8% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 12,997 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 3,405 shares during the period. Mount Yale Investment Advisors LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $4,572,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in the company. State Street Corp raised its stake in 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 buying an additional 471,792 shares during the last quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC increased its holdings in shares of 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 in the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. raised its position in shares of Accenture by 1.2% in 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 purchasing an additional 56,937 shares during the last quarter. Clearbridge Investments LLC grew its position in Accenture by 44.7% during the 2nd quarter. Clearbridge Investments LLC now owns 2,709,989 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $822,238,000 after purchasing an additional 837,677 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Swedbank AB increased its stake in Accenture by 16.6% during the 3rd quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 2,551,679 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $901,967,000 after purchasing an additional 363,401 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Insider Activity

In other news, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the 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 directly owns 6 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,062.20. This represents a 99.81 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total transaction of $134,437.50. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now owns 5,149 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,845,916.50. This trade represents a 6.79 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 9,196 shares of company stock worth $3,226,918 over the last quarter. Insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research firms have recently commented on ACN. Wolfe Research upgraded shares of Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price target on the stock in a report on Wednesday, January 8th. Robert W. Baird restated a “neutral” rating and issued a $370.00 price target on shares of Accenture in a research note on Tuesday, December 3rd. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price objective on Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, December 16th. Jefferies Financial Group lowered their target price on shares of Accenture from $385.00 to $355.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, January 21st. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group raised shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and boosted their price objective for the company from $370.00 to $420.00 in a report on Friday, December 6th. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have given a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Accenture currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $383.74.

Accenture Stock Performance

ACN opened at $362.65 on Monday. The firm has a market cap of $226.94 billion, a P/E ratio of 30.42, a PEG ratio of 3.20 and a beta of 1.24. Accenture plc has a 1-year low of $278.69 and a 1-year high of $387.51. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $357.37 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $348.01. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.47.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The business had revenue of $17.69 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $3.27 EPS. Accenture’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.69 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be paid a $1.48 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, January 16th. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.63%. Accenture’s payout ratio is 49.66%.

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.