Hancock Whitney Corp Lowers Holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Hancock Whitney Corp reduced its stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 5.8% in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 7,631 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 466 shares during the quarter. Hancock Whitney Corp’s holdings in Accenture were worth $2,697,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of ACN. Schrum Private Wealth Management LLC lifted its stake in Accenture by 78.6% in the 3rd quarter. Schrum Private Wealth Management LLC now owns 11,448 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $4,047,000 after purchasing an additional 5,038 shares in the last quarter. MQS Management LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Accenture in the third quarter worth about $1,040,000. Concurrent Investment Advisors LLC boosted its stake in Accenture by 70.6% during the third quarter. Concurrent Investment Advisors LLC now owns 35,591 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $12,581,000 after buying an additional 14,724 shares during the last quarter. M&G PLC increased its stake in Accenture by 34.1% in the 3rd quarter. M&G PLC now owns 292,808 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $103,361,000 after acquiring an additional 74,438 shares during the last quarter. Finally, BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp raised its holdings in shares of Accenture by 18.7% during the 2nd quarter. BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp now owns 172,199 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $52,247,000 after acquiring an additional 27,168 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research analysts recently weighed in on ACN shares. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut their target price on shares of Accenture from $376.00 to $370.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, September 24th. 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 note on Friday, September 27th. StockNews.com downgraded shares of Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, October 24th. BMO Capital Markets boosted their price objective on Accenture from $380.00 to $390.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research note on Friday, September 27th. Finally, Barclays raised their price objective on Accenture from $350.00 to $415.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, September 30th. Ten equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have issued a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $368.23.

Accenture Stock Performance

Shares of ACN opened at $361.29 on Tuesday. The stock has a market capitalization of $225.86 billion, a PE ratio of 31.61, a PEG ratio of 3.14 and a beta of 1.25. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $356.57 and a 200-day moving average price of $329.61. Accenture plc has a fifty-two week low of $278.69 and a fifty-two week high of $387.51.

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

Accenture Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 15th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, October 10th were given a $1.48 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, October 10th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.64%. This is an increase from Accenture’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.29. Accenture’s payout ratio is presently 51.79%.

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

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Accenture news, insider Angela Beatty sold 673 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, October 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $372.18, for a total value of $250,477.14. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 5,650 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,102,817. This trade represents a 10.64 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CFO Kathleen R. Mcclure sold 5,090 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated 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 sale, the chief financial officer now owns 38,825 shares in the company, valued at $14,490,266.50. The trade was a 11.59 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 36,298 shares of company stock worth $13,372,661 in the last 90 days. 0.07% of the stock is owned by corporate 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.