Willner & Heller LLC Invests $220,000 in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Willner & Heller LLC acquired a new position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor acquired 624 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $220,000.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Morse Asset Management Inc bought a new position in shares of Accenture during the third quarter valued at approximately $25,000. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Accenture in the 3rd quarter valued at $30,000. Retirement Wealth Solutions LLC bought a new position in shares of Accenture in the 4th quarter worth $34,000. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC boosted its position in Accenture by 607.1% during the third 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 in the last quarter. Finally, RPg Family Wealth Advisory LLC bought a new position in Accenture in the third quarter worth about $39,000. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities research analysts have weighed in on ACN shares. Royal Bank of Canada raised their target price on shares of Accenture from $377.00 to $389.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, September 27th. Guggenheim increased their price objective on Accenture from $380.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. TD Cowen upgraded Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their target price for the company from $321.00 to $400.00 in a research report on Monday, September 30th. UBS Group lifted their price objective on shares of Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, December 20th. Finally, Bank of America raised their target price on shares of Accenture from $365.00 to $388.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $385.04.

Insider Activity at Accenture

In other Accenture news, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $343.70, for a total transaction of $1,096,746.70. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 6 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,062.20. The trade was a 99.81 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 673 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, October 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $372.18, for a total transaction of $250,477.14. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 5,650 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,102,817. This trade represents a 10.64 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 17,125 shares of company stock valued at $6,184,820. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Accenture Trading Up 0.5 %

Shares of Accenture stock opened at $352.33 on Monday. Accenture plc has a twelve month low of $278.69 and a twelve month high of $387.51. The firm’s 50-day moving average price is $357.59 and its 200 day moving average price is $345.65. 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 firm has a market capitalization of $220.49 billion, a PE ratio of 29.56, a P/E/G ratio of 3.11 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The firm had revenue of $17.69 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $17.15 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $3.27 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.0% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 12.69 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be given a $1.48 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, January 16th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.68%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 49.66%.

Accenture announced that its Board of Directors has initiated a share repurchase program on Thursday, September 26th that allows the company to buyback $4.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization allows the information technology services provider to purchase up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback programs are generally a sign that the company’s management believes its shares are undervalued.

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.