Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Shares Purchased by China Universal Asset Management Co. Ltd.

China Universal Asset Management Co. Ltd. boosted its position in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 37.5% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 3,094 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 843 shares during the period. China Universal Asset Management Co. Ltd.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $1,088,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of the company. Czech National Bank grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 6.5% during the third quarter. Czech National Bank now owns 127,601 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $45,104,000 after purchasing an additional 7,791 shares during the last quarter. Eldred Rock Partners LLC grew its stake in Accenture by 4.3% during the 3rd quarter. Eldred Rock Partners LLC now owns 29,867 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $10,557,000 after buying an additional 1,241 shares during the last quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC increased its position in Accenture by 45.4% during the third quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 10,096 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $3,569,000 after buying an additional 3,151 shares during the period. Diversified Trust Co boosted its holdings in shares of Accenture by 45.2% in the third quarter. Diversified Trust Co now owns 10,607 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $3,750,000 after acquiring an additional 3,302 shares during the period. Finally, Everpar Advisors LLC grew its position in shares of Accenture by 26.8% during the third quarter. Everpar Advisors LLC now owns 1,122 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $397,000 after acquiring an additional 237 shares during the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of brokerages recently weighed in on ACN. Piper Sandler increased 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. 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. UBS Group increased their price objective on Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, December 20th. Robert W. Baird restated a “neutral” rating and set a $370.00 price target on shares of Accenture in a research note on Tuesday, December 3rd. Finally, BNP Paribas lowered shares of Accenture from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $375.00 price objective on the stock. in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $387.22.

Accenture Stock Performance

Shares of ACN opened at $384.88 on Friday. The company has a 50-day moving average of $359.56 and a two-hundred day moving average of $349.88. The stock has a market cap of $240.86 billion, a P/E ratio of 32.29, a PEG ratio of 3.33 and a beta of 1.24. Accenture plc has a 12-month low of $278.69 and a 12-month high of $387.51. The company has a current ratio of 1.47, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating 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 firm had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $3.27 EPS. Accenture’s revenue was up 9.0% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, research analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 12.69 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced 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 of this dividend is Thursday, January 16th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.54%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 49.66%.

Insider Transactions at Accenture

In related news, General Counsel Joel Unruch sold 4,750 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, January 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $362.78, for a total value of $1,723,205.00. Following the sale, the general counsel now directly owns 20,526 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $7,446,422.28. This trade represents a 18.79 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total transaction of $134,437.50. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 5,149 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,845,916.50. This trade represents a 6.79 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 16,446 shares of company stock worth $5,852,848 over the last ninety days. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

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.