Beacon Capital Management LLC Buys 2,258 Shares of Accenture PLC (NYSE:ACN)

Beacon Capital Management LLC raised its stake in Accenture PLC (NYSE:ACN) by 472.4% during the 1st quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 2,736 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after buying an additional 2,258 shares during the quarter. Beacon Capital Management LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $854,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in ACN. Norges Bank bought a new position in Accenture during the fourth quarter worth about $2,351,683,000. GAMMA Investing LLC raised its position in shares of Accenture by 30,256.8% during the first quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 3,421,519 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,067,651,000 after purchasing an additional 3,410,248 shares during the period. Wellington Management Group LLP lifted its holdings in shares of Accenture by 22.8% during the 4th quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 12,175,518 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $4,283,225,000 after purchasing an additional 2,260,740 shares in the last quarter. Raymond James Financial Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Accenture in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $666,495,000. Finally, Capital Research Global Investors increased its stake in Accenture by 16.8% during the 4th quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 12,295,748 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $4,325,526,000 after purchasing an additional 1,770,024 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research analysts have weighed in on the stock. Barclays cut their price target on shares of Accenture from $415.00 to $390.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, March 24th. Baird R W raised shares of Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Monday, March 17th. UBS Group reiterated a “buy” rating and set a $395.00 target price (up previously from $390.00) on shares of Accenture in a report on Thursday, May 22nd. Guggenheim dropped their price target on Accenture from $400.00 to $395.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, March 21st. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their price objective on Accenture from $349.00 to $353.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fourteen have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Accenture presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $380.00.

Insider Buying and Selling at Accenture

In related news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 2,284 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, April 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $281.63, for a total transaction of $643,242.92. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 9,965 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,806,442.95. This trade represents a 18.65% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 169 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, April 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $281.90, for a total value of $47,641.10. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 5,364 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,512,111.60. This represents a 3.05% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 8,516 shares of company stock worth $2,507,366 over the last ninety days. Insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Stock Performance

NYSE ACN opened at $312.03 on Wednesday. The firm has a market capitalization of $195.43 billion, a P/E ratio of 25.77, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.17 and a beta of 1.33. The company has a current ratio of 1.48, a quick ratio of 1.48 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17. The firm’s fifty day moving average price is $306.40 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $334.90. Accenture PLC has a 1 year low of $275.01 and a 1 year high of $398.35.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.81 by $0.01. The business had revenue of $16.70 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $16.64 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.43% and a return on equity of 26.49%. Accenture’s revenue was up 5.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the business posted $2.77 EPS. As a group, research analysts anticipate that Accenture PLC will post 12.73 EPS for the current year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, April 10th were issued a dividend of $1.48 per share. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.90%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, April 10th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is 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.