Root Financial Partners LLC Acquires New Shares in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Root Financial Partners LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The firm acquired 813 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $286,000.

Several other hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of ACN. Baldwin Wealth Partners LLC MA lifted its holdings in Accenture by 6.5% during the 4th quarter. Baldwin Wealth Partners LLC MA now owns 63,429 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $22,314,000 after buying an additional 3,883 shares during the period. Schrum Private Wealth Management LLC lifted its stake in shares of Accenture by 78.6% in the 3rd quarter. Schrum Private Wealth Management LLC now owns 11,448 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $4,047,000 after purchasing an additional 5,038 shares during the period. MQS Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Accenture in the 3rd quarter valued at about $1,040,000. Concurrent Investment Advisors LLC lifted its stake in shares of Accenture by 70.6% in the 3rd quarter. Concurrent Investment Advisors LLC now owns 35,591 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $12,581,000 after purchasing an additional 14,724 shares during the period. Finally, M&G PLC lifted its stake in shares of Accenture by 34.1% in the 3rd quarter. M&G PLC now owns 292,808 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $103,361,000 after purchasing an additional 74,438 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research analysts have recently issued reports on ACN shares. Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on Accenture from $335.00 to $380.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday, January 31st. BNP Paribas lowered Accenture from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $375.00 target price for the company. in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their target price on Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, December 16th. Jefferies Financial Group decreased their target price on Accenture from $385.00 to $355.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, January 21st. Finally, BMO Capital Markets boosted their target price on Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, December 20th. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $387.22.

Accenture Price Performance

Accenture stock opened at $387.99 on Friday. Accenture plc has a 12 month low of $278.69 and a 12 month high of $398.35. 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 business’s 50 day simple moving average is $364.78 and its 200 day simple moving average is $353.68. The company has a market cap of $242.80 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 32.55, a PEG ratio of 3.44 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its quarterly earnings data 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 business had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $17.15 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. Accenture’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $3.27 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.73 EPS for the current year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, February 14th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, January 16th were given a dividend of $1.48 per share. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, January 16th. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.53%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is currently 49.66%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, December 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total value of $134,437.50. Following the transaction, the insider now 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 transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 232 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $394.46, for a total transaction of $91,514.72. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 8,915 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,516,610.90. The trade was a 2.54 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 22,280 shares of company stock worth $8,316,190 over the last 90 days. Corporate insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

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.