Mirova US LLC Grows Stock Holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Mirova US LLC boosted its stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 26.4% in the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The fund owned 713,474 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 149,119 shares during the period. Accenture makes up about 3.0% of Mirova US LLC’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 14th biggest position. Mirova US LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $250,993,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other large investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in ACN. State Street Corp grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 1.8% in the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 27,400,836 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $9,685,648,000 after purchasing an additional 471,792 shares during the period. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC raised its holdings in Accenture by 378.9% during the third quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 5,491,736 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,941,219,000 after purchasing an additional 4,345,039 shares in the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. grew its position in shares of Accenture by 2.9% during the fourth quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 4,964,480 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,746,455,000 after acquiring an additional 140,726 shares during the last quarter. Amundi grew its position in shares of Accenture by 27.9% during the fourth quarter. Amundi now owns 3,790,069 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,353,909,000 after acquiring an additional 826,038 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Swedbank AB grew its position in shares of Accenture by 47.5% during the fourth quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 3,763,690 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,324,029,000 after acquiring an additional 1,212,011 shares during the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CFO Angie Y. Park sold 685 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred 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 sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 8,674 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,073,892.12. The trade was a 7.32 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total transaction of $134,437.50. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 5,149 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,845,916.50. This trade represents a 6.79 % 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.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities research analysts have commented on ACN shares. Wolfe Research upgraded shares of Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 target price on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, January 8th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price target on Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, December 16th. BMO Capital Markets lifted their price target on Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research note on Friday, December 20th. StockNews.com downgraded shares of Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday, March 11th. Finally, Robert W. Baird upgraded Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $390.00 target price for the company in a report on Monday. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, sixteen have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Accenture currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $388.04.

Accenture Stock Up 2.3 %

Shares of ACN stock opened at $326.25 on Tuesday. The stock has a market cap of $204.16 billion, a P/E ratio of 27.37, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. Accenture plc has a 52 week low of $278.69 and a 52 week high of $398.35. The company has a quick ratio of 1.47, a current ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $362.51 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $358.14.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The business had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.15 billion. During the same period last year, the company posted $3.27 earnings per share. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. Analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 12.73 EPS for the current fiscal year.

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.