Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Shares Purchased by Liberty Capital Management Inc.

Liberty Capital Management Inc. raised its stake in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 11.0% in the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 3,710 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 368 shares during the period. Liberty Capital Management Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $1,311,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Several other hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 1.1% during the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 59,718,732 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $20,699,110,000 after purchasing an additional 635,349 shares during the last quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 1.2% during the second quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 10,912,962 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $3,311,102,000 after purchasing an additional 131,544 shares during the last quarter. Capital Research Global Investors grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 2.0% during the first quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 8,652,537 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $2,999,056,000 after purchasing an additional 173,107 shares during the last quarter. Legal & General Group Plc grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 1.4% during the second quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 5,887,266 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,786,256,000 after purchasing an additional 80,514 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Lazard Asset Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 4.1% during the first quarter. Lazard Asset Management LLC now owns 3,797,028 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,316,086,000 after purchasing an additional 148,738 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Accenture news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 458 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, October 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $373.25, for a total value of $170,948.50. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 9,777 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,649,265.25. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. In other Accenture news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 458 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, October 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $373.25, for a total value of $170,948.50. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 9,777 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,649,265.25. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, COO John F. Walsh sold 5,000 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, October 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $373.24, for a total transaction of $1,866,200.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief operating officer now directly owns 17,593 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $6,566,411.32. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 19,548 shares of company stock worth $7,322,278 in the last ninety days. Insiders own 0.07% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research firms recently issued reports on ACN. Morgan Stanley lowered Accenture from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and lowered their price target for the stock from $382.00 to $300.00 in a report on Wednesday, June 26th. Mizuho raised their price target on Accenture from $352.00 to $365.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, September 18th. Barclays raised their price target on Accenture from $350.00 to $415.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, September 30th. UBS Group raised their price target on Accenture from $400.00 to $415.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada raised their price target on Accenture from $377.00 to $389.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Accenture currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $371.18.

Accenture Price Performance

Shares of Accenture stock opened at $371.69 on Wednesday. Accenture plc has a 1 year low of $278.69 and a 1 year high of $387.51. The company has a market capitalization of $232.94 billion, a P/E ratio of 34.04, a P/E/G ratio of 3.47 and a beta of 1.25. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $347.76 and a 200 day moving average price of $322.19.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, September 26th. The information technology services provider reported $2.79 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.78 by $0.01. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.83% and a net margin of 11.20%. The firm had revenue of $16.41 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $16.37 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $2.71 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 2.6% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts expect that Accenture plc will post 12.79 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture announced that its Board of Directors has initiated a stock buyback plan on Thursday, September 26th that authorizes the company to buyback $4.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the information technology services provider to purchase up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback plans are often a sign that the company’s leadership believes its shares are undervalued.

Accenture Increases Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, November 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, October 10th will be given a dividend of $1.48 per share. This is an increase from Accenture’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.29. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.59%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, October 10th. Accenture’s payout ratio is currently 54.21%.

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.