Angela Beatty Sells 961 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Stock

Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) insider Angela Beatty sold 961 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, January 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.47, for a total transaction of $340,645.67. Following the sale, the insider now owns 5,484 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,943,913.48. This represents a 14.91 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink.

Angela Beatty also recently made the following trade(s):

• On Monday, December 23rd, Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of Accenture stock. The stock was sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total value of $134,437.50.

Accenture Trading Up 0.7 %

NYSE:ACN opened at $359.08 on Thursday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a current ratio of 1.47. Accenture plc has a 1 year low of $278.69 and a 1 year high of $387.51. The stock has a market cap of $224.71 billion, a P/E ratio of 30.12, a P/E/G ratio of 3.14 and a beta of 1.24. The stock has a 50-day simple moving average of $357.40 and a 200-day simple moving average of $346.66.

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

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be given a dividend of $1.48 per share. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.65%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, January 16th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 49.66%.

Accenture announced that its Board of Directors has initiated a share repurchase plan on Thursday, September 26th that permits the company to repurchase $4.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization permits the information technology services provider to repurchase up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are generally an indication that the company’s leadership believes its shares are undervalued.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities analysts have recently commented on the company. Wolfe Research raised Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price target on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, January 8th. Jefferies Financial Group lowered their target price on shares of Accenture from $385.00 to $355.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday. BNP Paribas downgraded shares of Accenture from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $375.00 price target on the stock. in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Barclays lifted their target price on shares of Accenture from $350.00 to $415.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, September 30th. Finally, Piper Sandler upped their price target on Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Accenture currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $383.74.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Mayflower Financial Advisors LLC grew its position in shares of Accenture by 3.8% during the fourth quarter. Mayflower Financial Advisors LLC now owns 2,855 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,004,000 after acquiring an additional 104 shares during the last quarter. Axiom Financial Strategies LLC grew its position in Accenture by 4.5% during the 4th quarter. Axiom Financial Strategies LLC now owns 868 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $305,000 after purchasing an additional 37 shares during the last quarter. Patriot Financial Group Insurance Agency LLC acquired a new position in Accenture in the fourth quarter valued at $340,000. Hutchens & Kramer Investment Management Group LLC boosted its stake in shares of Accenture by 6.2% during the fourth quarter. Hutchens & Kramer Investment Management Group LLC now owns 800 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $281,000 after buying an additional 47 shares during the period. Finally, Patrick M Sweeney & Associates Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 2.3% during the fourth quarter. Patrick M Sweeney & Associates Inc. now owns 1,969 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $693,000 after buying an additional 45 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors 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.