Taikang Asset Management Hong Kong Co Ltd Sells 9,419 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Taikang Asset Management Hong Kong Co Ltd lessened its holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 50.0% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 9,419 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 9,419 shares during the quarter. Taikang Asset Management Hong Kong Co Ltd’s holdings in Accenture were worth $3,314,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Accenture by 0.7% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 60,394,657 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $21,246,236,000 after purchasing an additional 392,183 shares during the period. State Street Corp raised its position 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 worth $9,685,648,000 after purchasing an additional 471,792 shares during the last quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC grew its position 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 last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. increased its stake in shares of Accenture by 2.9% in the fourth quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 4,964,480 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,746,455,000 after buying an additional 140,726 shares during the period. Finally, Amundi lifted its stake in shares of Accenture by 27.9% in the fourth quarter. Amundi now owns 3,790,069 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,353,909,000 after acquiring an additional 826,038 shares during the period. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, insider Angela Beatty sold 961 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, January 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.47, for a total value of $340,645.67. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 5,484 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,943,913.48. This trade represents a 14.91 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CFO Angie Y. Park sold 685 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.38, for a total value of $242,750.30. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 8,674 shares in the company, valued at $3,073,892.12. This trade represents a 7.32 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 21,905 shares of company stock worth $8,181,753 over the last quarter. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

ACN has been the subject of a number of recent analyst reports. Robert W. Baird raised shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $390.00 target price for the company in a research report on Monday, March 17th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their target price on shares of Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, December 16th. Piper Sandler cut their price target on shares of Accenture from $396.00 to $364.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, March 20th. UBS Group lowered their price objective on Accenture from $455.00 to $387.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Friday. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada decreased their target price on Accenture from $399.00 to $392.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Friday. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $378.91.

Accenture Trading Up 0.6 %

NYSE ACN opened at $307.24 on Tuesday. The stock has a market capitalization of $192.27 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.78, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The business’s fifty day moving average is $358.32 and its 200-day moving average is $357.10. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.47. Accenture plc has a one year low of $278.69 and a one year high of $398.35.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.81 by $0.01. The business had revenue of $16.70 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $16.64 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. Accenture’s revenue for the quarter was up 5.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $2.77 earnings per share. Equities research analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 12.73 EPS for the current year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, April 10th will be issued a dividend of $1.48 per share. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.93%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, April 10th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 48.89%.

Accenture Company 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.