Boston Family Office LLC Sells 225 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Boston Family Office LLC lessened its stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 6.7% in the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The fund owned 3,121 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 225 shares during the period. Boston Family Office LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $1,098,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in the stock. HighTower Advisors LLC grew its stake in Accenture by 12.5% in the 3rd quarter. HighTower Advisors LLC now owns 582,894 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $206,097,000 after buying an additional 64,553 shares during the last quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC grew its position in shares of Accenture by 2.8% in the third quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 1,847,496 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $653,043,000 after purchasing an additional 50,995 shares during the last quarter. Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. bought a new position in shares of Accenture in the third quarter worth about $1,866,000. Intrepid Capital Management Inc. boosted its stake in Accenture by 6.4% during the 3rd quarter. Intrepid Capital Management Inc. now owns 3,486 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,232,000 after purchasing an additional 210 shares during the period. Finally, IHT Wealth Management LLC grew its holdings in Accenture by 15.5% in the 3rd quarter. IHT Wealth Management LLC now owns 10,757 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $3,797,000 after buying an additional 1,442 shares during the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research firms have recently weighed in on ACN. Barclays reduced their price objective on Accenture from $415.00 to $390.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, March 24th. Baird R W upgraded shares of Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Monday, March 17th. The Goldman Sachs Group raised shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their price objective for the company from $370.00 to $420.00 in a research report on Friday, December 6th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their price target on Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, December 16th. Finally, UBS Group reduced their price objective on Accenture from $455.00 to $387.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, March 21st. Eight investment 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 company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $378.23.

Accenture Price Performance

Shares of ACN stock opened at $313.50 on Wednesday. The stock’s fifty day moving average is $353.32 and its 200-day moving average is $355.55. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a current ratio of 1.47. Accenture plc has a 52 week low of $278.69 and a 52 week high of $398.35. The stock has a market capitalization of $196.35 billion, a PE ratio of 26.30, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its earnings results 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 the consensus estimate of $16.64 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $2.77 earnings per share. The company’s revenue was up 5.7% on a year-over-year basis. Equities research analysts expect that Accenture plc will post 12.73 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, April 10th will be given a dividend of $1.48 per share. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, April 10th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.89%. Accenture’s payout ratio is currently 48.89%.

Insider Activity at Accenture

In other Accenture news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on 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 transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 11,858 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,677,625.26. This trade represents a 42.58 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CFO Angie Y. Park sold 685 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, January 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $354.38, for a total transaction of $242,750.30. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 8,674 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,073,892.12. The trade was a 7.32 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 21,905 shares of company stock worth $8,181,753 over the last 90 days. Insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

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.