Congress Wealth Management LLC DE Purchases 218 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Congress Wealth Management LLC DE raised its position in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 0.2% during the 1st quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund owned 88,355 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 218 shares during the period. Congress Wealth Management LLC DE’s holdings in Accenture were worth $30,625,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of the company. Schonfeld Strategic Advisors LLC grew its position in Accenture by 77.9% in the third quarter. Schonfeld Strategic Advisors LLC now owns 9,832 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $3,020,000 after acquiring an additional 4,305 shares in the last quarter. Jones Financial Companies Lllp boosted its stake in Accenture by 46.6% during the third quarter. Jones Financial Companies Lllp now owns 14,989 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $4,603,000 after buying an additional 4,765 shares during the period. SRS Capital Advisors Inc. raised its stake in shares of Accenture by 9.6% in the third quarter. SRS Capital Advisors Inc. now owns 2,024 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $621,000 after acquiring an additional 178 shares during the period. Truist Financial Corp lifted its holdings in shares of Accenture by 5.3% in the 3rd quarter. Truist Financial Corp now owns 1,016,269 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $312,106,000 after acquiring an additional 50,860 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Shelton Capital Management boosted its stake in shares of Accenture by 45.3% during the 3rd quarter. Shelton Capital Management now owns 35,133 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $10,790,000 after purchasing an additional 10,947 shares during the period. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Insider Activity

In related news, CEO Jean-Marc Ollagnier sold 6,250 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, April 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $315.91, for a total value of $1,974,437.50. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 161,581 shares in the company, valued at $51,045,053.71. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. In other Accenture news, CEO Jean-Marc Ollagnier sold 6,250 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, April 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $315.91, for a total transaction of $1,974,437.50. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 161,581 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $51,045,053.71. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, insider Ellyn Shook sold 5,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, April 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $307.22, for a total value of $1,536,100.00. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 13,699 shares in the company, valued at $4,208,606.78. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 20,083 shares of company stock valued at $6,302,285. Company insiders own 0.07% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Stock Performance

ACN stock traded down $0.98 on Monday, hitting $302.43. 2,411,094 shares of the company’s stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 2,914,076. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $300.17 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $336.05. Accenture plc has a 12-month low of $278.69 and a 12-month high of $387.51. The stock has a market cap of $189.53 billion, a P/E ratio of 27.71, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.38 and a beta of 1.23.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last released its earnings results on Thursday, June 20th. The information technology services provider reported $3.13 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $3.15 by ($0.02). The company had revenue of $16.47 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $16.55 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 27.48% and a net margin of 10.79%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was down .6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $3.19 EPS. Sell-side analysts expect that Accenture plc will post 11.95 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, August 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, July 11th will be given a dividend of $1.29 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, July 11th. This represents a $5.16 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.71%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is currently 47.25%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

ACN has been the topic of a number of analyst reports. Citigroup cut their target price on Accenture from $430.00 to $400.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, March 22nd. StockNews.com cut shares of Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Saturday, April 27th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft cut shares of Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and lowered their price objective for the company from $409.00 to $295.00 in a research report on Wednesday, May 15th. Wedbush decreased their price target on shares of Accenture from $400.00 to $350.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, June 12th. Finally, Guggenheim reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $395.00 price objective on shares of Accenture in a research note on Friday, May 24th. Twelve analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twelve 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 target price of $352.74.

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.