Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Shares Sold by Penserra Capital Management LLC

Penserra Capital Management LLC reduced its stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 0.4% during the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 21,284 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 91 shares during the quarter. Penserra Capital Management LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $7,522,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Swedbank AB purchased a new position in shares of Accenture during the 1st quarter valued at approximately $820,912,000. Clearbridge Investments LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Accenture by 44.7% in the 2nd quarter. Clearbridge Investments LLC now owns 2,709,989 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $822,238,000 after purchasing an additional 837,677 shares during the last quarter. 1832 Asset Management L.P. boosted its position in Accenture by 251.3% during the 2nd quarter. 1832 Asset Management L.P. now owns 995,896 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $302,165,000 after purchasing an additional 712,400 shares during the period. International Assets Investment Management LLC grew its stake in Accenture by 37,788.5% during the 3rd quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 510,358 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $180,401,000 after buying an additional 509,011 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Renaissance Technologies LLC bought a new stake in Accenture in the second quarter valued at $125,126,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research firms recently weighed in on ACN. Guggenheim increased their price objective on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $395.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. Bank of America lifted their price target on Accenture from $365.00 to $388.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. Piper Sandler raised Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and increased their price objective for the stock from $329.00 to $395.00 in a report on Thursday, September 26th. UBS Group lifted their target price on Accenture from $400.00 to $415.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, September 27th. Finally, Barclays increased their price target on Accenture from $350.00 to $415.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, September 30th. Ten investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $368.23.

Insider Activity

In other news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 458 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $373.25, for a total transaction of $170,948.50. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 9,777 shares in the company, valued at $3,649,265.25. The trade was a 4.47 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, November 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $343.70, for a total value of $1,096,746.70. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 6 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,062.20. This represents a 99.81 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 36,298 shares of company stock worth $13,372,661 over the last quarter. Corporate insiders own 0.07% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Stock Down 0.7 %

Shares of NYSE ACN opened at $358.66 on Monday. Accenture plc has a 52-week low of $278.69 and a 52-week high of $387.51. The stock has a market capitalization of $224.22 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 31.38, a PEG ratio of 3.16 and a beta of 1.25. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $356.42 and its 200 day simple moving average is $329.23.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, September 26th. The information technology services provider reported $2.79 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.78 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $16.41 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $16.37 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.20% and a return on equity of 26.83%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 2.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $2.71 earnings per share. As a group, analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 12.77 earnings per share for the current year.

Accenture Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, October 10th were paid a dividend of $1.48 per share. This is an increase from Accenture’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.29. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.65%. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, October 10th. Accenture’s payout ratio is 51.79%.

Accenture announced that its Board of Directors has initiated a stock buyback plan on Thursday, September 26th that permits the company to buyback $4.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization permits the information technology services provider to repurchase up to 1.8% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are often an indication that the company’s board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

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.