BMO Capital Markets Lowers Accenture (NYSE:ACN) Price Target to $370.00

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) had its target price reduced by analysts at BMO Capital Markets from $425.00 to $370.00 in a research note issued to investors on Tuesday,Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has a “market perform” rating on the information technology services provider’s stock. BMO Capital Markets’ target price indicates a potential upside of 13.41% from the company’s current price.

Several other research firms also recently weighed in on ACN. UBS Group upped their price objective on shares of Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price objective on shares of Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, December 16th. Morgan Stanley cut their target price on Accenture from $380.00 to $372.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Monday. Wolfe Research upgraded Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price target on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, January 8th. Finally, Baird R W raised Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Monday. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, sixteen have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $385.65.

Accenture Trading Up 2.3 %

NYSE:ACN opened at $326.25 on Tuesday. The stock has a market cap of $204.16 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 27.37, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a current ratio of 1.47. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $362.51 and its 200 day simple moving average is $358.14. Accenture has a one year low of $278.69 and a one year high of $398.35.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.43 by $0.16. The company had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $17.15 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The firm’s revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $3.27 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that Accenture will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Transactions at Accenture

In related news, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, December 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total value of $134,437.50. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 5,149 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,845,916.50. This represents a 6.79 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $394.47, for a total transaction of $3,468,574.71. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 11,858 shares in the company, valued at $4,677,625.26. This trade represents a 42.58 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 22,280 shares of company stock valued at $8,316,190 over the last three months. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Accenture

A number of large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in Accenture in the 4th quarter valued at about $2,351,683,000. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC lifted its position in shares of Accenture by 378.9% in 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 buying an additional 4,345,039 shares during the last quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP increased its holdings in shares of Accenture by 22.8% during the 4th quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 12,175,518 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $4,283,225,000 after acquiring an additional 2,260,740 shares during the last quarter. Raymond James Financial Inc. bought a new stake in Accenture in the 4th quarter valued at $666,495,000. Finally, Capital Research Global Investors lifted its holdings in Accenture by 16.8% during the 4th quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 12,295,748 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $4,325,526,000 after purchasing an additional 1,770,024 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

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.