Cannell & Spears LLC Acquires 1,025 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Cannell & Spears LLC grew its holdings in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 44.2% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 3,346 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after buying an additional 1,025 shares during the period. Cannell & Spears LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $1,177,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

Other hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of the company. Newbridge Financial Services Group Inc. grew its stake in Accenture by 5.7% in the 4th 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 in the last quarter. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Accenture by 62.2% during the 4th quarter. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. now owns 73 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $28,000 after acquiring an additional 28 shares during the last quarter. New England Professional Planning Group Inc. grew its position in Accenture by 4.6% in the fourth quarter. New England Professional Planning Group Inc. now owns 655 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $230,000 after acquiring an additional 29 shares in the last quarter. TCW Group Inc. increased its stake in Accenture by 0.3% in the third quarter. TCW Group Inc. now owns 11,501 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $4,065,000 after acquiring an additional 30 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Neville Rodie & Shaw Inc. lifted its stake in Accenture by 4.3% during the fourth quarter. Neville Rodie & Shaw Inc. now owns 725 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $255,000 after purchasing an additional 30 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities analysts have recently commented on the company. Barclays reduced their price objective on Accenture from $415.00 to $390.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, March 24th. BMO Capital Markets lifted their price target on shares of Accenture to $355.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday, March 26th. Robert W. Baird raised shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $390.00 target price on the stock in a report on Monday, March 17th. Guggenheim lowered their price target on shares of Accenture from $400.00 to $395.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, March 21st. Finally, Baird R W raised Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Monday, March 17th. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $378.23.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $394.47, for a total value of $3,468,574.71. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 11,858 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,677,625.26. The trade was a 42.58 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CFO Angie Y. Park sold 685 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction on Friday, January 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $354.38, for a total value of $242,750.30. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 8,674 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,073,892.12. The trade was a 7.32 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 21,905 shares of company stock valued at $8,181,753 over the last quarter. Corporate insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Price Performance

ACN stock opened at $312.78 on Tuesday. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $354.17 and a 200 day moving average of $355.81. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.47. The company has a market cap of $195.90 billion, a P/E ratio of 26.24, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. Accenture plc has a 1 year low of $278.69 and a 1 year high of $398.35.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last released its earnings results on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.81 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $16.70 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $16.64 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 5.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $2.77 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.73 EPS for the current year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, April 10th will be given a dividend of $1.48 per share. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, April 10th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.89%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 48.89%.

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.