Accenture (NYSE:ACN) Lowered to Hold Rating by StockNews.com

StockNews.com cut shares of Accenture (NYSE:ACN) from a buy rating to a hold rating in a report published on Friday.

Several other research analysts also recently weighed in on the company. Piper Sandler upped their target price on Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday. Susquehanna increased their price objective on shares of Accenture from $350.00 to $360.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. Barclays boosted their target price on shares of Accenture from $350.00 to $415.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, September 30th. UBS Group boosted their price objective on Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday. Finally, Bank of America raised their target price on Accenture from $365.00 to $388.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. Nine equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fourteen have given a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $383.23.

Accenture Price Performance

Shares of NYSE ACN opened at $366.37 on Friday. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $360.47 and its 200-day simple moving average is $337.15. Accenture has a 12 month low of $278.69 and a 12 month high of $387.51. The stock has a market capitalization of $229.04 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 32.05, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a net margin of 11.20% and a return on equity of 26.83%. The business had revenue of $17.69 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $3.27 earnings per share. The company’s revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. Analysts anticipate that Accenture will post 12.74 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

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

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be given a dividend of $1.48 per share. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.62%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, January 16th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is presently 51.79%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Accenture

In other Accenture news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 9,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, October 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $376.16, for a total value of $3,385,440.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 20,324 shares in the company, valued at $7,645,075.84. The trade was a 30.69 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 458 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $373.25, for a total value of $170,948.50. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now owns 9,777 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,649,265.25. This trade represents a 4.47 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 36,298 shares of company stock valued at $13,372,661 in the last three months. 0.07% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in ACN. Morse Asset Management Inc acquired a new stake in Accenture in the third quarter valued at $25,000. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. purchased a new stake in Accenture during the third quarter worth approximately $30,000. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC raised its holdings in Accenture by 607.1% during the third quarter. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC now owns 99 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $35,000 after purchasing an additional 85 shares in the last quarter. RPg Family Wealth Advisory LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Accenture during the 3rd quarter worth approximately $39,000. Finally, Reston Wealth Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of Accenture in the 3rd quarter valued at $51,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% 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.