Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Shares Sold by Waterloo Capital L.P.

Waterloo Capital L.P. decreased its holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 25.7% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 1,620 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 560 shares during the quarter. Waterloo Capital L.P.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $570,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other large investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. purchased a new stake in Accenture during the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $1,866,000. Morse Asset Management Inc acquired a new stake in shares of Accenture during the third quarter worth $25,000. EP Wealth Advisors LLC increased its stake in Accenture by 28.8% in the 3rd quarter. EP Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 31,967 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $11,300,000 after buying an additional 7,151 shares during the period. iSAM Funds UK Ltd purchased a new position in Accenture during the 3rd quarter worth $550,000. Finally, Dunhill Financial LLC lifted its stake in shares of Accenture by 37.5% in the 3rd quarter. Dunhill Financial LLC now owns 253 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $89,000 after acquiring an additional 69 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE ACN opened at $285.04 on Monday. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $349.68 and a 200-day simple moving average of $354.67. 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 $178.53 billion, a PE ratio of 23.91, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.32. Accenture plc has a 12 month low of $275.00 and a 12 month high of $398.35.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.81 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $16.70 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $16.64 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. Accenture’s revenue was up 5.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $2.77 EPS. On average, equities analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, April 10th will be issued a $1.48 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, April 10th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.08%. Accenture’s payout ratio is 48.89%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts recently commented on ACN shares. BMO Capital Markets raised their price objective on shares of Accenture to $355.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, March 26th. Baird R W raised Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Monday, March 17th. Guggenheim dropped their price objective on Accenture from $400.00 to $395.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, March 21st. StockNews.com downgraded Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Tuesday, March 11th. Finally, Barclays lowered 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. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Accenture has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $378.23.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Accenture news, 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 transaction of $242,750.30. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 8,674 shares in the company, valued at $3,073,892.12. This represents a 7.32 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 961 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $354.47, for a total value of $340,645.67. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 5,484 shares in the company, valued at $1,943,913.48. This represents a 14.91 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders sold 21,905 shares of company stock valued at $8,181,753. Insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Accenture 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.