Norges Bank Invests $2.35 Billion in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Norges Bank purchased a new position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) during the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund purchased 6,684,906 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $2,351,683,000.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Caisse Des Depots ET Consignations bought a new stake in Accenture in the 4th quarter worth $42,613,000. Blair William & Co. IL raised its holdings in Accenture by 13.6% in the 4th quarter. Blair William & Co. IL now owns 731,875 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $257,466,000 after purchasing an additional 87,785 shares in the last quarter. AssuredPartners Investment Advisors LLC bought a new stake in shares of Accenture during the 4th quarter valued at about $366,000. NEOS Investment Management LLC lifted its holdings in Accenture by 31.1% in the fourth quarter. NEOS Investment Management LLC now owns 36,707 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $12,913,000 after buying an additional 8,708 shares during the period. Finally, Moment Partners LLC bought a new position in shares of Accenture in the 4th quarter worth approximately $525,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CFO Angie Y. Park sold 685 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $354.38, for a total transaction of $242,750.30. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 8,674 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,073,892.12. The trade was a 7.32 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 961 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on 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 sale, the insider now directly owns 5,484 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,943,913.48. This represents a 14.91 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders sold 21,905 shares of company stock valued at $8,181,753. 0.02% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several brokerages recently issued reports on ACN. BMO Capital Markets increased their price target on shares of Accenture to $355.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their price target on shares of Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, December 16th. Barclays reduced their price target on shares of Accenture from $415.00 to $390.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Monday. Royal Bank of Canada cut their target price on Accenture from $399.00 to $392.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, March 21st. Finally, Mizuho dropped their price target on shares of Accenture from $428.00 to $398.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, March 19th. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Accenture has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $378.23.

Accenture Stock Up 0.8 %

Shares of ACN opened at $311.38 on Thursday. Accenture plc has a 12-month low of $278.69 and a 12-month high of $398.35. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $356.77 and a 200-day moving average price of $356.56. The firm has a market capitalization of $194.86 billion, a P/E ratio of 26.12, a P/E/G ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The company has a current ratio of 1.47, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.81 by $0.01. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The company had revenue of $16.70 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $16.64 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $2.77 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 5.7% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities research analysts expect that Accenture plc will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, April 10th will be paid 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 1.90%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is currently 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.