Salvus Wealth Management LLC Increases Stock Holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Salvus Wealth Management LLC boosted its stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 2.4% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The firm owned 1,434 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 33 shares during the period. Salvus Wealth Management LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $504,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Morse Asset Management Inc purchased a new position in Accenture in the 3rd quarter valued at about $25,000. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Accenture during the third quarter worth $30,000. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC raised its position in shares of Accenture by 607.1% in the third quarter. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC now owns 99 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $35,000 after buying an additional 85 shares during the last quarter. RPg Family Wealth Advisory LLC acquired a new position in Accenture during the third quarter worth about $39,000. Finally, Reston Wealth Management LLC purchased a new stake in Accenture during the 3rd quarter valued at about $51,000. 75.14% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Accenture Trading Up 0.3 %

NYSE ACN opened at $350.92 on Friday. 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 firm has a market cap of $219.60 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.44, a PEG ratio of 3.11 and a beta of 1.24. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $357.85 and a 200-day simple moving average of $344.97. Accenture plc has a one year low of $278.69 and a one year high of $387.51.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. The business had revenue of $17.69 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $17.15 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $3.27 earnings per share. Equities research analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 12.69 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be paid a $1.48 dividend. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.69%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, January 16th. Accenture’s payout ratio is presently 49.66%.

Accenture announced that its board has authorized a stock repurchase program on Thursday, September 26th that allows the company to buyback $4.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization allows the information technology services provider to reacquire up to 1.8% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are usually an indication that the company’s leadership believes its shares are undervalued.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research analysts have recently weighed in on the company. Piper Sandler Companies restated a “neutral” rating and set a $329.00 target price on shares of Accenture in a report on Friday, September 20th. BMO Capital Markets upped their target price on Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. Robert W. Baird reissued a “neutral” rating and set a $370.00 price target on shares of Accenture in a research report on Tuesday, December 3rd. Royal Bank of Canada raised their price objective on shares of Accenture from $377.00 to $389.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. Finally, UBS Group boosted their target price on shares of Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Accenture currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $385.04.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 9,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, October 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $376.16, for a total value of $3,385,440.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 20,324 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $7,645,075.84. This represents a 30.69 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total value of $134,437.50. Following the sale, 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 ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders have sold 26,125 shares of company stock worth $9,570,260. Company insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

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.