Cape ANN Savings Bank Grows Position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Cape ANN Savings Bank boosted its position in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 1.6% in the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The institutional investor owned 4,102 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 64 shares during the quarter. Cape ANN Savings Bank’s holdings in Accenture were worth $1,443,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in ACN. Y Intercept Hong Kong Ltd purchased a new stake in Accenture in the 4th quarter worth approximately $350,000. Cabot Wealth Management Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Accenture by 3.6% during the fourth quarter. Cabot Wealth Management Inc. now owns 32,486 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $11,428,000 after acquiring an additional 1,123 shares in the last quarter. MONECO Advisors LLC boosted its holdings in Accenture by 26.9% in the fourth quarter. MONECO Advisors LLC now owns 1,713 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $603,000 after acquiring an additional 363 shares in the last quarter. Howard Capital Management Inc. purchased a new position in Accenture during the 4th quarter valued at $1,531,000. Finally, New England Professional Planning Group Inc. raised its holdings in Accenture by 4.6% in the 4th quarter. New England Professional Planning Group Inc. now owns 655 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $230,000 after purchasing an additional 29 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Trading Down 5.3 %

Shares of NYSE:ACN opened at $364.35 on Monday. Accenture plc has a 1 year low of $278.69 and a 1 year high of $398.35. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $367.48 and its 200-day moving average price is $356.65. The company has a market cap of $228.00 billion, a P/E ratio of 30.57, a PEG ratio of 3.41 and a beta of 1.24. 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 (NYSE:ACN) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating 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 firm had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $3.27 EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts expect that Accenture plc will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 232 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction on Wednesday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $394.46, for a total value of $91,514.72. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 8,915 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,516,610.90. The trade was a 2.54 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $394.47, for a total value of $3,468,574.71. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 11,858 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,677,625.26. This represents a 42.58 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders sold 22,280 shares of company stock valued at $8,316,190. Company insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

ACN has been the topic of several research analyst reports. UBS Group boosted their price target on shares of Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, December 20th. StockNews.com raised Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, January 13th. Piper Sandler lifted their price target on Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Morgan Stanley increased their price objective on Accenture from $335.00 to $380.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, January 31st. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group upgraded shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and boosted their target price for the company from $370.00 to $420.00 in a report on Friday, December 6th. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Accenture currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $387.22.

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.