Arvest Investments Inc. Decreases Holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Arvest Investments Inc. cut its holdings in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 6.8% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 4,928 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 357 shares during the quarter. Arvest Investments Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $1,734,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the business. Royal London Asset Management Ltd. raised its stake in shares of Accenture by 1.2% during the fourth quarter. Royal London Asset Management Ltd. now owns 318,517 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $112,051,000 after acquiring an additional 3,744 shares in the last quarter. Bank of Marin grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 8.4% in the fourth quarter. Bank of Marin now owns 3,080 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,084,000 after purchasing an additional 238 shares during the last quarter. VSM Wealth Advisory LLC bought a new position in shares of Accenture in the fourth quarter worth approximately $106,000. Xponance Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 8.6% in the fourth quarter. Xponance Inc. now owns 97,765 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $34,393,000 after purchasing an additional 7,769 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Intech Investment Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 50.3% in the fourth quarter. Intech Investment Management LLC now owns 70,187 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $24,691,000 after purchasing an additional 23,484 shares during the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several research analysts have recently issued reports on ACN shares. UBS Group raised their target price on shares of Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. Jefferies Financial Group cut their target price on shares of Accenture from $385.00 to $355.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, January 21st. Stifel Nicolaus cut their price target on shares of Accenture from $390.00 to $380.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, February 26th. 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 report on Monday, December 16th. Finally, Baird R W upgraded shares of Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Monday. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $384.45.

Insider Transactions at Accenture

In other Accenture news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $394.47, for a total value of $3,468,574.71. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 11,858 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,677,625.26. The trade was a 42.58 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the business’s 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 completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 5,149 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,845,916.50. This trade represents a 6.79 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 22,280 shares of company stock valued at $8,316,190 in the last quarter. 0.02% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Accenture Price Performance

ACN opened at $324.52 on Thursday. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $361.19 and a 200-day moving average price of $357.78. 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 firm has a market cap of $203.08 billion, a PE ratio of 27.22, a P/E/G ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. Accenture plc has a 1 year low of $278.69 and a 1 year high of $398.35.

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

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.