Horan Capital Advisors LLC. Sells 1,612 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Horan Capital Advisors LLC. cut its position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 13.4% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 10,446 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 1,612 shares during the quarter. Accenture makes up approximately 1.2% of Horan Capital Advisors LLC.’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 23rd largest holding. Horan Capital Advisors LLC.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $3,675,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of the stock. Swedbank AB grew its stake in shares of Accenture by 16.6% during the 3rd quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 2,551,679 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $901,967,000 after purchasing an additional 363,401 shares during the period. Pure Financial Advisors LLC grew its stake in Accenture by 1.7% in the 3rd quarter. Pure Financial Advisors LLC now owns 1,931 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $683,000 after acquiring an additional 33 shares during the period. Van ECK Associates Corp lifted its holdings in Accenture by 8.7% in the 3rd quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp now owns 144,230 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $53,456,000 after purchasing an additional 11,529 shares in the last quarter. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. lifted its holdings in Accenture by 3.8% in the 3rd quarter. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. now owns 443,254 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $156,681,000 after purchasing an additional 16,261 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Donaldson Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of Accenture by 1.3% during the 3rd quarter. Donaldson Capital Management LLC now owns 247,565 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $87,509,000 after acquiring an additional 3,154 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Stock Performance

Shares of ACN stock opened at $344.57 on Tuesday. Accenture plc has a 1-year low of $278.69 and a 1-year high of $398.35. The company has a current ratio of 1.47, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17. The company has a market capitalization of $215.63 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 28.91, a P/E/G ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $366.99 and its 200-day simple moving average is $358.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The business had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $3.27 earnings per share. Accenture’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, sell-side analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts have recently commented on ACN shares. Wolfe Research raised Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price objective for the company in a research report on Wednesday, January 8th. StockNews.com upgraded Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, January 13th. Piper Sandler boosted their price objective on Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. BMO Capital Markets boosted their price objective on Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research note on Friday, December 20th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus cut their price target on Accenture from $390.00 to $380.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, February 26th. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have given a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $388.96.

Insider Activity

In other Accenture news, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total value of $134,437.50. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now owns 5,149 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,845,916.50. The trade was a 6.79 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $394.47, for a total value of $3,468,574.71. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 11,858 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,677,625.26. This represents a 42.58 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 22,280 shares of company stock worth $8,316,190. 0.02% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

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.