SCS Capital Management LLC Takes Position in Accenture PLC $ACN

SCS Capital Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Accenture PLC (NYSE:ACN) during the first quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The fund acquired 5,855 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $1,827,000.

A number of other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in ACN. Lipe & Dalton raised its stake in Accenture by 2,087.4% during the first quarter. Lipe & Dalton now owns 5,031 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,570,000 after buying an additional 4,801 shares in the last quarter. United Bank acquired a new stake in Accenture during the first quarter valued at approximately $758,000. Exchange Traded Concepts LLC raised its stake in Accenture by 62.2% during the first quarter. Exchange Traded Concepts LLC now owns 905 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $282,000 after buying an additional 347 shares in the last quarter. Ceredex Value Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in Accenture during the first quarter valued at approximately $35,934,000. Finally, Clearstead Trust LLC raised its stake in Accenture by 15.2% during the first quarter. Clearstead Trust LLC now owns 3,479 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,086,000 after buying an additional 458 shares in the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities analysts recently issued reports on ACN shares. Evercore ISI started coverage on Accenture in a report on Thursday, July 17th. They issued an “outperform” rating and a $330.00 price objective for the company. Morgan Stanley reduced their target price on Accenture from $325.00 to $271.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday. UBS Group reiterated a “buy” rating and set a $395.00 price objective (up from $390.00) on shares of Accenture in a report on Thursday, May 22nd. Argus set a $370.00 target price on Accenture in a report on Tuesday, June 24th. Finally, Mizuho set a $348.00 price target on Accenture and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, June 24th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, fifteen have issued a Buy rating, nine have assigned a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $348.12.

Insider Activity at Accenture

In related news, CEO Mauro Macchi sold 500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, July 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $282.34, for a total transaction of $141,170.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer owned 2,283 shares in the company, valued at $644,582.22. This represents a 17.97% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 2,251 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, July 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $282.45, for a total transaction of $635,794.95. Following the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 8,109 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,290,387.05. The trade was a 21.73% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 2,954 shares of company stock worth $834,280 over the last quarter. Company insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Trading Down 1.4%

ACN opened at $252.07 on Wednesday. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $266.92 and its 200 day simple moving average is $295.69. The company has a current ratio of 1.46, a quick ratio of 1.46 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16. Accenture PLC has a 12 month low of $236.67 and a 12 month high of $398.35. The stock has a market capitalization of $157.88 billion, a P/E ratio of 20.07, a P/E/G ratio of 2.19 and a beta of 1.30.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its earnings results on Friday, June 20th. The information technology services provider reported $3.49 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.32 by $0.17. The company had revenue of $17.73 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $17.26 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.61% and a return on equity of 26.55%. Accenture’s quarterly revenue was up 7.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $3.13 EPS. Accenture has set its Q4 2025 guidance at EPS. FY 2025 guidance at 12.770-12.890 EPS. As a group, research analysts anticipate that Accenture PLC will post 12.73 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, August 15th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, July 10th were issued a dividend of $1.48 per share. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.3%. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, July 10th. Accenture’s payout ratio is 47.13%.

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.