Mesirow Financial Investment Management Inc. Grows Stock Holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Mesirow Financial Investment Management Inc. grew its holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 0.3% during the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund owned 102,055 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 255 shares during the period. Accenture makes up about 0.7% of Mesirow Financial Investment Management Inc.’s holdings, making the stock its 29th largest holding. Mesirow Financial Investment Management Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $35,907,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other large investors have also made changes to their positions in the company. Morse Asset Management Inc purchased a new stake in Accenture during the third quarter worth $25,000. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. boosted its holdings in Accenture by 62.2% during the fourth quarter. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. now owns 73 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $28,000 after buying an additional 28 shares in the last quarter. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. acquired a new position in Accenture during the third quarter worth $30,000. Kohmann Bosshard Financial Services LLC acquired a new position in Accenture during the fourth quarter worth $30,000. Finally, POM Investment Strategies LLC raised its position in Accenture by 64.2% during the fourth quarter. POM Investment Strategies LLC now owns 87 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $31,000 after acquiring an additional 34 shares during the period. 75.14% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

ACN has been the subject of a number of research analyst reports. Robert W. Baird restated a “neutral” rating and set a $370.00 price objective on shares of Accenture in a research report on Tuesday, December 3rd. Wolfe Research upgraded shares of Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 target price for the company in a research report on Wednesday, January 8th. UBS Group increased their target price 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. Piper Sandler increased their target price on shares of Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus reduced their target price on shares of Accenture from $390.00 to $380.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, February 26th. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have given a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $388.96.

Insider Activity at Accenture

In other Accenture news, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total transaction of $134,437.50. Following the sale, the insider now owns 5,149 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,845,916.50. This trade represents a 6.79 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 1,487 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, January 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.54, for a total transaction of $527,200.98. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 9,247 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,278,431.38. The trade was a 13.85 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 22,280 shares of company stock valued at $8,316,190 over the last 90 days. 0.02% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Accenture Stock Down 2.0 %

Shares of NYSE:ACN opened at $341.34 on Friday. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $366.03 and its 200 day moving average price is $358.18. The stock has a market cap of $213.61 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 28.64, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. Accenture plc has a fifty-two week low of $278.69 and a fifty-two week high of $398.35. The company has a quick ratio of 1.47, a current ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. The firm had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $17.15 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The firm’s revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $3.27 earnings per share. As a group, equities research analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

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.