Horan Securities Inc. Lowers Holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Horan Securities Inc. lowered its holdings in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 9.4% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 987 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 103 shares during the quarter. Horan Securities Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $347,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Morse Asset Management Inc purchased a new position in Accenture during the third quarter worth approximately $25,000. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. boosted its position in Accenture by 62.2% during the fourth quarter. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. now owns 73 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $28,000 after purchasing an additional 28 shares in the last quarter. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Accenture during the third quarter valued at approximately $30,000. Kohmann Bosshard Financial Services LLC acquired a new position in shares of Accenture during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $30,000. Finally, POM Investment Strategies LLC raised its holdings in shares of Accenture by 64.2% during the fourth quarter. POM Investment Strategies LLC now owns 87 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $31,000 after acquiring an additional 34 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities analysts have commented on ACN shares. The Goldman Sachs Group raised Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and increased their target price for the company from $370.00 to $420.00 in a report on Friday, December 6th. Jefferies Financial Group reduced their target price on Accenture from $385.00 to $355.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, January 21st. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their target price on Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, December 16th. Morgan Stanley increased their price target on Accenture from $335.00 to $380.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, January 31st. Finally, Wolfe Research raised Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price target for the company in a report on Wednesday, January 8th. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Accenture presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $388.96.

Accenture Price Performance

Shares of NYSE ACN opened at $341.68 on Friday. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $365.74 and its two-hundred day moving average is $358.46. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.47. Accenture plc has a 1-year low of $278.69 and a 1-year high of $398.35. The company has a market cap of $213.82 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 28.66, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24.

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

Insider Transactions at Accenture

In other news, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total transaction of $134,437.50. Following the completion of the transaction, 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 position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. 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 value of $242,750.30. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 8,674 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,073,892.12. This represents a 7.32 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last ninety days, insiders sold 22,280 shares of company stock valued at $8,316,190. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

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.