Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Shares Sold by Waters Parkerson & CO. LLC

Waters Parkerson & CO. LLC lessened its position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 0.2% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 206,330 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 398 shares during the period. Accenture makes up 3.8% of Waters Parkerson & CO. LLC’s holdings, making the stock its 7th largest position. Waters Parkerson & CO. LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $72,585,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in ACN. WBI Investments LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Accenture in the fourth quarter worth $1,956,000. Wimmer Associates 1 LLC grew its stake in Accenture by 2.0% in the fourth quarter. Wimmer Associates 1 LLC now owns 2,060 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $725,000 after acquiring an additional 40 shares during the period. St. Clair Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Accenture in the 4th quarter valued at about $686,000. Two Sigma Advisers LP boosted its holdings in Accenture by 14.9% during the fourth quarter. Two Sigma Advisers LP now owns 8,500 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $2,990,000 after purchasing an additional 1,100 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Texas Bank & Trust Co acquired a new position in shares of Accenture during the 4th quarter worth approximately $2,866,000. 75.14% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Accenture Stock Down 1.8%

ACN stock opened at $317.45 on Monday. The firm’s 50-day moving average is $302.60 and its two-hundred day moving average is $341.15. 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 $198.83 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.63, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.35. Accenture plc has a 52 week low of $275.01 and a 52 week high of $398.35.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last released its earnings results on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.81 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $16.70 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $16.64 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 5.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $2.77 EPS. On average, analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, May 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, April 10th were paid a dividend of $1.48 per share. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.86%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, April 10th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 48.89%.

Insider Activity

In other news, General Counsel Joel Unruch sold 3,563 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, April 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $281.78, for a total transaction of $1,003,982.14. Following the completion of the transaction, the general counsel now directly owns 17,237 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,857,041.86. The trade was a 17.13% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, COO John F. Walsh sold 2,500 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, May 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $325.00, for a total transaction of $812,500.00. Following the transaction, the chief operating officer now owns 15,882 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,161,650. The trade was a 13.60% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 8,516 shares of company stock valued at $2,507,366 in the last 90 days. 0.02% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

ACN has been the topic of several research reports. Barclays decreased their price target on shares of Accenture from $415.00 to $390.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, March 24th. StockNews.com lowered Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Tuesday, March 11th. Guggenheim decreased their price target on Accenture from $400.00 to $395.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Friday, March 21st. Jefferies Financial Group cut their price target on shares of Accenture from $385.00 to $355.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, January 21st. Finally, Mizuho decreased their price objective on Accenture from $428.00 to $398.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, March 19th. Seven investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $381.76.

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.