Great Lakes Retirement Inc. Boosts Stake in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Great Lakes Retirement Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 1.0% during the 1st quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm owned 4,797 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after buying an additional 48 shares during the quarter. Great Lakes Retirement Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $1,663,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other large investors have also modified their holdings of ACN. Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of Accenture during the fourth quarter worth about $2,061,490,000. DZ BANK AG Deutsche Zentral Genossenschafts Bank Frankfurt am Main lifted its position in shares of Accenture by 100.0% during the fourth quarter. DZ BANK AG Deutsche Zentral Genossenschafts Bank Frankfurt am Main now owns 1,751,531 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $614,615,000 after purchasing an additional 875,723 shares during the last quarter. Winslow Capital Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Accenture during the fourth quarter worth about $288,168,000. Generation Investment Management LLP bought a new position in Accenture in the fourth quarter worth about $286,220,000. Finally, Public Employees Retirement Association of Colorado acquired a new position in Accenture in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $263,421,000. Institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Trading Up 0.3 %

NYSE:ACN traded up $1.09 during midday trading on Friday, hitting $329.19. 5,371,854 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 2,953,049. The company has a market capitalization of $206.30 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.15, a P/E/G ratio of 3.63 and a beta of 1.23. Accenture plc has a one year low of $278.69 and a one year high of $387.51. The business has a 50-day moving average price of $300.80 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $332.19.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, June 20th. The information technology services provider reported $3.13 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $3.15 by ($0.02). Accenture had a return on equity of 27.48% and a net margin of 10.79%. The business had revenue of $16.47 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $16.55 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $3.19 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was down .6% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 11.95 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, August 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, July 11th will be given a dividend of $1.29 per share. This represents a $5.16 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.57%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, July 11th. Accenture’s payout ratio is 47.25%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, insider Ellyn Shook sold 5,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, April 25th. The shares were sold at an average price of $307.22, for a total transaction of $1,536,100.00. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 13,699 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,208,606.78. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. In related news, insider Ellyn Shook sold 5,000 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction on Thursday, April 25th. The shares were sold at an average price of $307.22, for a total value of $1,536,100.00. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now owns 13,699 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,208,606.78. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 3,776 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction on Friday, July 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $309.05, for a total transaction of $1,166,972.80. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 11,819 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,652,661.95. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 13,276 shares of company stock worth $4,103,233. Corporate insiders own 0.07% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities analysts have commented on ACN shares. Wedbush decreased their target price on Accenture from $400.00 to $350.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, June 12th. Citigroup decreased their target price on Accenture from $430.00 to $400.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, March 22nd. Guggenheim restated a “buy” rating and issued a $395.00 target price on shares of Accenture in a research note on Friday, May 24th. Mizuho decreased their target price on Accenture from $398.00 to $350.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, June 18th. Finally, BMO Capital Markets cut their price target on Accenture from $375.00 to $350.00 and set a “market perform” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, June 21st. Eleven research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twelve have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $351.82.

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.