Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Shares Acquired by Hilltop National Bank

Hilltop National Bank raised its holdings in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 6.6% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 1,283 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 79 shares during the period. Hilltop National Bank’s holdings in Accenture were worth $451,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other large investors have also made changes to their positions in the company. Morse Asset Management Inc acquired a new position in shares of Accenture in the 3rd quarter valued at $25,000. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Accenture in the 3rd quarter valued at $30,000. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC increased its position in shares of Accenture by 607.1% in the 3rd quarter. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC now owns 99 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $35,000 after acquiring an additional 85 shares during the period. RPg Family Wealth Advisory LLC acquired a new position in shares of Accenture in the 3rd quarter valued at $39,000. Finally, Reston Wealth Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Accenture in the 3rd quarter valued at $51,000. 75.14% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts have commented on ACN shares. Piper Sandler upped their price target on shares of Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, December 19th. Wolfe Research raised shares of Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price target on the stock in a report on Wednesday. Citigroup upped their price target on shares of Accenture from $350.00 to $405.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, September 17th. Jefferies Financial Group upped their price target on shares of Accenture from $355.00 to $385.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group raised shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their price target for the company from $370.00 to $420.00 in a report on Friday, December 6th. Nine equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $385.04.

Accenture Price Performance

ACN opened at $349.93 on Friday. The company’s 50 day simple moving average is $357.82 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $343.77. Accenture plc has a 1-year low of $278.69 and a 1-year high of $387.51. The firm has a market capitalization of $218.98 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.62, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. The firm had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.15 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.20% and a return on equity of 26.83%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $3.27 EPS. On average, equities analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 12.74 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The company 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 dividend of $1.48 per share. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.69%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, January 16th. Accenture’s payout ratio is presently 49.66%.

Accenture declared that its board has approved a stock buyback program on Thursday, September 26th that allows the company to repurchase $4.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization allows the information technology services provider to reacquire up to 1.8% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock repurchase programs are usually an indication that the company’s leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

Insider Activity

In other Accenture news, CFO Kathleen R. Mcclure sold 5,090 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $373.22, for a total value of $1,899,689.80. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 38,825 shares in the company, valued at $14,490,266.50. The trade was a 11.59 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, November 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $343.70, for a total transaction of $1,096,746.70. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 6 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,062.20. This trade represents a 99.81 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders have sold 36,673 shares of company stock valued at $13,507,099. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

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.