Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Short Interest Down 8.5% in December

Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) saw a large decrease in short interest during the month of December. As of December 31st, there was short interest totalling 5,400,000 shares, a decrease of 8.5% from the December 15th total of 5,900,000 shares. Based on an average daily trading volume, of 2,440,000 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is currently 2.2 days. Currently, 0.9% of the shares of the company are short sold.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 9,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, October 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $376.16, for a total transaction of $3,385,440.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 20,324 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $7,645,075.84. This represents a 30.69 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 673 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, October 22nd. The shares were 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 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 disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders sold 26,125 shares of company stock worth $9,570,260. 0.02% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Accenture

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Edgestream Partners L.P. acquired a new position in Accenture during the second quarter valued at approximately $1,524,000. XTX Topco Ltd purchased a new position in shares of Accenture in the 2nd quarter valued at $1,999,000. Intech Investment Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Accenture by 13.8% during the 2nd quarter. Intech Investment Management LLC now owns 41,701 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $12,652,000 after acquiring an additional 5,045 shares in the last quarter. Brighton Jones LLC increased its holdings in Accenture by 4.6% in the 2nd quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 18,957 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $5,752,000 after purchasing an additional 840 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Clifford Group LLC raised its position in Accenture by 9.0% in the second quarter. Clifford Group LLC now owns 2,286 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $694,000 after purchasing an additional 189 shares during the period. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research analysts have weighed in on the stock. StockNews.com upgraded shares of Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, January 13th. Guggenheim raised their price objective on Accenture from $380.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, September 27th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their target price on Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, December 16th. Piper Sandler Companies reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and set a $329.00 price target on shares of Accenture in a research note on Friday, September 20th. Finally, Wolfe Research raised shares of Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price objective on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, January 8th. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have given a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $385.04.

Accenture Stock Performance

NYSE ACN opened at $352.33 on Friday. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $357.65 and its 200 day moving average price is $345.02. 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 has a twelve month low of $278.69 and a twelve month high of $387.51. The company has a market capitalization of $220.48 billion, a PE ratio of 29.56, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.11 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last released its earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The business had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $17.15 billion. During the same period last year, the company earned $3.27 earnings per share. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 9.0% on a year-over-year basis. On average, research analysts predict that Accenture will post 12.69 earnings per share for the current year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Investors of record on Thursday, January 16th will be given a $1.48 dividend. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.68%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, January 16th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 49.66%.

Accenture announced that its board has initiated a share buyback 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 reacquire up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback plans are usually an indication that the company’s management believes its shares are undervalued.

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.