Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Shares Acquired by Cornerstone Wealth Management LLC

Cornerstone Wealth Management LLC boosted its position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 17.0% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 2,193 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 319 shares during the period. Cornerstone Wealth Management LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $772,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of the company. Morse Asset Management Inc acquired a new position in Accenture during the third quarter worth about $25,000. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. bought a new position in shares of Accenture during the 3rd quarter valued at about $30,000. Retirement Wealth Solutions LLC acquired a new position in shares of Accenture in the 4th quarter worth approximately $34,000. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of Accenture by 607.1% in the 3rd 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. Finally, RPg Family Wealth Advisory LLC acquired a new stake in Accenture during the third quarter valued at approximately $39,000. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms have issued reports on ACN. The Goldman Sachs Group raised Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their price target for the company from $370.00 to $420.00 in a report on Friday, December 6th. TD Cowen raised Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their target price for the company from $321.00 to $400.00 in a report on Monday, September 30th. Wolfe Research raised Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price target on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, January 8th. BMO Capital Markets raised their target price on shares of Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. Finally, BNP Paribas lowered shares of Accenture from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $375.00 price target on the stock. in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $383.74.

Accenture Stock Performance

ACN stock opened at $362.65 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $226.94 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.42, a P/E/G ratio of 3.20 and a beta of 1.24. The firm has a 50 day moving average of $357.37 and a two-hundred day moving average of $347.30. The company has a quick ratio of 1.47, a current ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17. Accenture plc has a 12 month low of $278.69 and a 12 month high of $387.51.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. The company had revenue of $17.69 billion for 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%. The business’s revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the company earned $3.27 earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 12.69 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

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 issued a dividend of $1.48 per share. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, January 16th. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.63%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 49.66%.

Insider Activity

In related news, insider Angela Beatty sold 961 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.47, for a total transaction of $340,645.67. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now owns 5,484 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,943,913.48. The trade was a 14.91 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 1,487 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, January 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $354.54, for a total value of $527,200.98. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 9,247 shares in the company, valued at $3,278,431.38. This trade represents a 13.85 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 17,332 shares of company stock valued at $6,172,719 over the last 90 days. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Accenture 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.