Allen Capital Group LLC Purchases Shares of 854 Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Allen Capital Group LLC bought a new position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the SEC. The fund bought 854 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $302,000.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of ACN. Unique Wealth Strategies LLC purchased a new position in shares of Accenture in the 2nd quarter worth approximately $26,000. Strategic Financial Concepts LLC purchased a new position in shares of Accenture in the 2nd quarter worth approximately $28,000. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Accenture in the 3rd quarter worth approximately $30,000. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Accenture by 607.1% in the 3rd quarter. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC now owns 99 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $35,000 after purchasing an additional 85 shares during the period. Finally, Creekmur Asset Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Accenture by 108.0% in the 1st quarter. Creekmur Asset Management LLC now owns 104 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $36,000 after purchasing an additional 54 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities analysts have recently commented on the company. Mizuho lifted their target price on Accenture from $352.00 to $365.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, September 18th. BMO Capital Markets boosted their price objective on Accenture from $380.00 to $390.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. Susquehanna boosted their price objective on Accenture from $350.00 to $360.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. Piper Sandler upgraded Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and boosted their price objective for the company from $329.00 to $395.00 in a report on Thursday, September 26th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their price objective on Accenture from $376.00 to $370.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, September 24th. Ten equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $368.23.

Insider Buying and Selling at Accenture

In other news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 458 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, October 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $373.25, for a total value of $170,948.50. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 9,777 shares in the company, valued at $3,649,265.25. This represents a 4.47 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $343.70, for a total value of $1,096,746.70. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 6 shares in the company, valued at $2,062.20. The trade was a 99.81 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders have sold 36,298 shares of company stock worth $13,372,661. 0.07% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Accenture Trading Down 0.7 %

ACN opened at $358.66 on Friday. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $356.42 and a 200-day moving average price of $328.98. Accenture plc has a 12 month low of $278.69 and a 12 month high of $387.51. The firm has a market cap of $224.22 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 31.38, a PEG ratio of 3.10 and a beta of 1.25.

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

Accenture Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, October 10th were paid a dividend of $1.48 per share. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.65%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, October 10th. 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 authorized a share repurchase program on Thursday, September 26th that allows the company to repurchase $4.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization allows the information technology services provider to reacquire up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are often a sign that the company’s management believes its stock is undervalued.

Accenture 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.