Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Shares Sold by Davis Rea LTD.

Davis Rea LTD. lessened its position in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 25.4% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 27,604 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 9,410 shares during the quarter. Accenture comprises about 4.9% of Davis Rea LTD.’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 10th largest position. Davis Rea LTD.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $9,711,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. State Street Corp raised its position in shares of 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 during the last quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC increased its holdings in Accenture by 378.9% in the third 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 purchasing an additional 4,345,039 shares during the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its stake in Accenture by 1.2% in the third 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. Swedbank AB boosted its holdings in Accenture by 47.5% during the fourth quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 3,763,690 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,324,029,000 after buying an additional 1,212,011 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Stifel Financial Corp increased its stake in shares of Accenture by 1.5% in the 3rd quarter. Stifel Financial Corp now owns 1,892,409 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $668,974,000 after acquiring an additional 28,491 shares during the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts have recently weighed in on the stock. Morgan Stanley lifted their price target on shares of Accenture from $335.00 to $380.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. UBS Group boosted their price objective on Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, December 20th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price target on shares of Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, December 16th. Piper Sandler raised their price objective on shares of Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, December 19th. Finally, StockNews.com raised shares of Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, January 13th. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $388.96.

Accenture Stock Down 0.4 %

Accenture stock opened at $356.96 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.47. The company’s 50-day moving average is $367.64 and its 200-day moving average is $357.33. The firm has a market capitalization of $223.38 billion, a PE ratio of 29.95, a P/E/G ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. Accenture plc has a fifty-two week low of $278.69 and a fifty-two week high of $398.35.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The firm had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $3.27 earnings per share. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Transactions at Accenture

In other Accenture news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 232 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $394.46, for a total value of $91,514.72. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 8,915 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,516,610.90. This represents a 2.54 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 2,497 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $354.48, for a total transaction of $885,136.56. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 28,866 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $10,232,419.68. The trade was a 7.96 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 22,280 shares of company stock worth $8,316,190 over the last quarter. Company insiders own 0.02% 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.