Alerus Financial NA Has $949,000 Holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Alerus Financial NA lowered its holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 3.8% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 2,697 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 106 shares during the quarter. Alerus Financial NA’s holdings in Accenture were worth $949,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Level Four Advisory Services LLC raised its holdings in shares of Accenture by 10.9% in the 4th quarter. Level Four Advisory Services LLC now owns 2,968 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,044,000 after acquiring an additional 291 shares during the last quarter. Pictet Asset Management Holding SA lifted its holdings in shares of Accenture by 10.8% in the fourth quarter. Pictet Asset Management Holding SA now owns 549,438 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $193,287,000 after purchasing an additional 53,593 shares in the last quarter. Nomura Asset Management Co. Ltd. grew its holdings in Accenture by 0.3% during the fourth quarter. Nomura Asset Management Co. Ltd. now owns 219,886 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $77,354,000 after buying an additional 741 shares in the last quarter. Broadway Wealth Solutions Inc. bought a new position in Accenture during the 4th quarter valued at $315,000. Finally, New Age Alpha Advisors LLC grew its stake in shares of Accenture by 6,335.5% in the 4th quarter. New Age Alpha Advisors LLC now owns 1,995 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $702,000 after acquiring an additional 1,964 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Insider Activity

In other Accenture news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 1,487 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, January 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $354.54, for a total transaction of $527,200.98. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 9,247 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,278,431.38. This trade represents a 13.85 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 2,497 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, January 17th. The stock was 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 $10,232,419.68. This represents a 7.96 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 21,905 shares of company stock worth $8,181,753. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research analysts recently weighed in on ACN shares. Baird R W upgraded shares of Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Monday, March 17th. Wolfe Research upgraded Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price target on the stock in a report on Wednesday, January 8th. StockNews.com lowered Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Tuesday, March 11th. BMO Capital Markets raised their price objective on shares of Accenture to $355.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a report on Wednesday. Finally, UBS Group reduced their target price on shares of Accenture from $455.00 to $387.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, March 21st. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $378.23.

Accenture Price Performance

NYSE:ACN opened at $308.51 on Friday. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $355.92 and a 200 day moving average of $356.23. Accenture plc has a 52-week low of $278.69 and a 52-week high of $398.35. The firm has a market capitalization of $193.06 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.88, a P/E/G ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a current ratio of 1.47.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates 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 net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. Accenture’s quarterly revenue was up 5.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm posted $2.77 earnings per share. On average, research analysts expect that Accenture plc will post 12.73 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, April 10th will be paid a dividend of $1.48 per share. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.92%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, April 10th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 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.