Johnson Investment Counsel Inc. Boosts Position in Accenture PLC $ACN

Johnson Investment Counsel Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Accenture PLC (NYSE:ACN) by 5.8% in the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 405,667 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 22,231 shares during the quarter. Accenture makes up approximately 1.1% of Johnson Investment Counsel Inc.’s portfolio, making the stock its 22nd biggest position. Johnson Investment Counsel Inc. owned approximately 0.06% of Accenture worth $121,250,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Kelly Lawrence W & Associates Inc. CA purchased a new position in shares of Accenture during the first quarter worth approximately $31,000. Inlight Wealth Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of Accenture during the first quarter worth approximately $32,000. RMG Wealth Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of Accenture during the second quarter worth approximately $33,000. WPG Advisers LLC purchased a new position in shares of Accenture during the first quarter worth approximately $42,000. Finally, Cheviot Value Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of Accenture during the first quarter worth approximately $43,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities analysts have recently issued reports on ACN shares. Wall Street Zen lowered shares of Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Saturday. Weiss Ratings restated a “hold (c-)” rating on shares of Accenture in a research report on Wednesday. Jefferies Financial Group restated a “hold” rating on shares of Accenture in a research note on Tuesday, September 30th. Benchmark restated a “mixed” rating on shares of Accenture in a research note on Friday, June 20th. Finally, Wolfe Research cut their price target on Accenture from $290.00 to $285.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, September 23rd. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, fourteen have assigned a Buy rating, ten have assigned a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $300.22.

Accenture Trading Down 4.3%

Shares of ACN stock opened at $241.11 on Friday. The business’s fifty day moving average price is $247.45 and its 200 day moving average price is $281.37. Accenture PLC has a 1-year low of $229.40 and a 1-year high of $398.35. The firm has a market capitalization of $151.01 billion, a PE ratio of 19.84, a P/E/G ratio of 2.10 and a beta of 1.28. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16, a current ratio of 1.42 and a quick ratio of 1.46.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, September 25th. The information technology services provider reported $3.03 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.98 by $0.05. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.45% and a net margin of 11.02%.The firm had revenue of $17.60 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.34 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $2.66 earnings per share. Accenture’s quarterly revenue was up 7.3% on a year-over-year basis. Accenture has set its FY 2026 guidance at 13.190-13.570 EPS. Q1 2026 guidance at EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that Accenture PLC will post 12.73 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, November 14th. Investors of record on Friday, October 10th will be issued a dividend of $1.63 per share. This is a boost from Accenture’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.48. This represents a $6.52 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.7%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, October 10th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is currently 48.72%.

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.