Stiles Financial Services Inc Sells 214 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Stiles Financial Services Inc reduced its position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 2.5% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 8,345 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 214 shares during the quarter. Accenture accounts for approximately 1.1% of Stiles Financial Services Inc’s holdings, making the stock its 26th biggest holding. Stiles Financial Services Inc’s holdings in Accenture were worth $2,936,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Newbridge Financial Services Group Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Accenture by 5.7% in the fourth quarter. Newbridge Financial Services Group Inc. now owns 518 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $182,000 after buying an additional 28 shares during the period. Howland Capital Management LLC increased its stake in Accenture by 18.9% in the fourth quarter. Howland Capital Management LLC now owns 3,417 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,202,000 after purchasing an additional 543 shares during the period. Birch Hill Investment Advisors LLC lifted its position in shares of Accenture by 0.3% during the fourth quarter. Birch Hill Investment Advisors LLC now owns 28,467 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $10,015,000 after purchasing an additional 82 shares during the last quarter. AlphaStar Capital Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Accenture in the fourth quarter worth about $209,000. Finally, Entropy Technologies LP increased its stake in Accenture by 212.0% in the 4th quarter. Entropy Technologies LP now owns 6,573 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $2,312,000 after buying an additional 4,466 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts have commented on ACN shares. StockNews.com upgraded shares of Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, January 13th. Jefferies Financial Group reduced their price objective on Accenture from $385.00 to $355.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, January 21st. Morgan Stanley increased their price target on Accenture from $335.00 to $380.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. Wolfe Research upgraded Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price objective for the company in a report on Wednesday, January 8th. Finally, UBS Group raised their target price on shares of Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, December 20th. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $387.22.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, December 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total transaction of $134,437.50. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 5,149 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,845,916.50. This represents a 6.79 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, CFO Angie Y. Park sold 685 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.38, for a total transaction of $242,750.30. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 8,674 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,073,892.12. This trade represents a 7.32 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 22,280 shares of company stock valued at $8,316,190 over the last 90 days. Insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Trading Down 0.3 %

NYSE ACN opened at $386.04 on Monday. The stock has a market cap of $241.58 billion, a P/E ratio of 32.39, a P/E/G ratio of 3.44 and a beta of 1.24. The company has a current ratio of 1.47, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17. Accenture plc has a 12-month low of $278.69 and a 12-month high of $398.35. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $362.30 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $352.18.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share for the quarter, beating 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 business had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $3.27 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be issued a $1.48 dividend. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.53%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, January 16th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 49.66%.

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.