Julie Spellman Sweet Sells 8,136 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Stock

Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,136 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, October 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $362.07, for a total transaction of $2,945,801.52. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 12,188 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,412,909.16. This trade represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink.

Julie Spellman Sweet also recently made the following trade(s):

• On Monday, October 21st, Julie Spellman Sweet sold 9,000 shares of Accenture stock. The shares were sold at an average price of $376.16, for a total transaction of $3,385,440.00.

Accenture Price Performance

Accenture stock opened at $346.59 on Thursday. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $351.80 and a 200-day simple moving average of $323.68. The stock has a market capitalization of $216.68 billion, a PE ratio of 30.32, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.47 and a beta of 1.25. Accenture plc has a 12-month low of $278.69 and a 12-month high of $387.51.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, September 26th. The information technology services provider reported $2.79 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.78 by $0.01. The firm had revenue of $16.41 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $16.37 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.20% and a return on equity of 26.83%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 2.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the firm posted $2.71 earnings per share. On average, analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.79 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, November 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, October 10th will be given a $1.48 dividend. This is an increase from Accenture’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.29. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, October 10th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.71%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is presently 51.79%.

Accenture declared that its board has authorized a share repurchase plan on Thursday, September 26th that allows the company to buyback $4.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization allows the information technology services provider to reacquire up to 1.8% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are often a sign that the company’s management believes its shares are undervalued.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the business. Unique Wealth Strategies LLC acquired a new position in Accenture in the 2nd quarter valued at $26,000. Strategic Financial Concepts LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Accenture during the 2nd quarter valued at about $28,000. CarsonAllaria Wealth Management Ltd. acquired a new stake in shares of Accenture during the 1st quarter valued at about $35,000. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC lifted its holdings in Accenture by 607.1% during the 3rd quarter. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC now owns 99 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $35,000 after purchasing an additional 85 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Creekmur Asset Management LLC lifted its holdings in Accenture by 108.0% during the 1st quarter. Creekmur Asset Management LLC now owns 104 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $36,000 after purchasing an additional 54 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

ACN has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. Robert W. Baird upped their price objective on shares of Accenture from $350.00 to $370.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. Barclays upped their price objective on shares of Accenture from $350.00 to $415.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, September 30th. Mizuho upped their price objective on shares of Accenture from $352.00 to $365.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, September 18th. BMO Capital Markets upped their target price on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $390.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research note on Friday, September 27th. Finally, Guggenheim upped their target price on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, September 27th. Ten research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have given a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $368.23.

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.