Hennion & Walsh Asset Management Inc. Reduces Position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Hennion & Walsh Asset Management Inc. lessened its holdings in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 3.1% in the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund owned 5,681 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 184 shares during the quarter. Hennion & Walsh Asset Management Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $1,999,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other large investors also recently bought and sold shares of the business. State Street Corp grew its stake in Accenture by 1.8% during the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 27,400,836 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $9,685,648,000 after acquiring an additional 471,792 shares in the last quarter. Legal & General Group Plc grew its stake in shares of Accenture by 1.4% in the 2nd quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 5,887,266 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,786,256,000 after buying an additional 80,514 shares during the period. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC grew its stake in shares of Accenture by 378.9% in the 3rd quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 5,491,736 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,941,219,000 after buying an additional 4,345,039 shares during the period. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. grew its stake in shares of Accenture by 1.2% in the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 4,823,754 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,705,100,000 after buying an additional 56,937 shares during the period. Finally, Clearbridge Investments LLC grew its stake in shares of Accenture by 44.7% in the 2nd quarter. Clearbridge Investments LLC now owns 2,709,989 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $822,238,000 after buying an additional 837,677 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, insider Angela Beatty sold 673 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction on Tuesday, October 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $372.18, for a total transaction of $250,477.14. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 5,650 shares in the company, valued at $2,102,817. This trade represents a 10.64 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction on Monday, November 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $343.70, for a total transaction of $1,096,746.70. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 6 shares in the company, valued at $2,062.20. This represents a 99.81 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 26,125 shares of company stock worth $9,570,260 in the last ninety days. 0.02% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Accenture Price Performance

Shares of ACN opened at $352.33 on Friday. Accenture plc has a twelve month low of $278.69 and a twelve month high of $387.51. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $357.65 and its 200-day simple moving average is $345.02. The firm has a market capitalization of $220.48 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.56, a PEG ratio of 3.11 and a beta of 1.24. 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 (NYSE:ACN) last announced 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. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The firm had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.15 billion. During the same period last year, the business earned $3.27 EPS. Accenture’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.69 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture declared that its Board of Directors has initiated a stock buyback program on Thursday, September 26th that allows the company to buyback $4.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization allows the information technology services provider to repurchase up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback programs are generally a sign that the company’s board believes its stock is undervalued.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

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

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several analysts have recently weighed in on the stock. Wolfe Research raised shares of Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price target for the company in a research note on Wednesday, January 8th. BNP Paribas cut shares of Accenture from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $375.00 price target for the company. in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. The Goldman Sachs Group raised shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and increased their price objective for the stock from $370.00 to $420.00 in a research report on Friday, December 6th. UBS Group increased their price objective on shares of Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, December 20th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada increased 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. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have given a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $385.04.

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.