Loomis Sayles & Co. L P Sells 95,238 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Loomis Sayles & Co. L P lessened its stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 22.2% during the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 334,192 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 95,238 shares during the quarter. Loomis Sayles & Co. L P’s holdings in Accenture were worth $117,565,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the company. Larson Financial Group LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Accenture by 17.6% during the third quarter. Larson Financial Group LLC now owns 1,114 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $394,000 after buying an additional 167 shares during the last quarter. Avestar Capital LLC raised its stake in Accenture by 30.7% during the 3rd quarter. Avestar Capital LLC now owns 3,333 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,178,000 after purchasing an additional 782 shares during the last quarter. Baldwin Investment Management LLC boosted its holdings in Accenture by 2.4% in the 3rd quarter. Baldwin Investment Management LLC now owns 12,950 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $4,578,000 after purchasing an additional 298 shares during the period. Cynosure Group LLC grew its position in Accenture by 18.4% in the 3rd quarter. Cynosure Group LLC now owns 1,504 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $532,000 after purchasing an additional 234 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Blueshift Asset Management LLC increased its holdings in shares of Accenture by 209.4% during the 3rd quarter. Blueshift Asset Management LLC now owns 5,777 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $2,042,000 after purchasing an additional 3,910 shares during the period. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insider Buying and Selling at Accenture

In other Accenture news, CFO Angie Y. Park sold 685 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, January 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $354.38, for a total value of $242,750.30. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 8,674 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,073,892.12. This trade represents a 7.32 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 2,497 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, January 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $354.48, for a total transaction of $885,136.56. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 28,866 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $10,232,419.68. This represents a 7.96 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders sold 21,905 shares of company stock worth $8,181,753. Insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Stock Performance

Shares of Accenture stock opened at $311.38 on Thursday. The firm has a market cap 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 debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.47. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $356.77 and a 200 day simple moving average of $356.56. Accenture plc has a fifty-two week low of $278.69 and a fifty-two week high of $398.35.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.81 by $0.01. The business had revenue of $16.70 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $16.64 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 5.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $2.77 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, April 10th will be paid a $1.48 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 10th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.90%. Accenture’s payout ratio is presently 48.89%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts recently weighed in on the company. Royal Bank of Canada decreased their target price on Accenture from $399.00 to $392.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, March 21st. Barclays decreased their price objective on Accenture from $415.00 to $390.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Monday. Morgan Stanley reduced their target price on Accenture from $380.00 to $372.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, March 17th. StockNews.com downgraded shares of Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday, March 11th. Finally, UBS Group dropped their price objective on shares of Accenture from $455.00 to $387.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, March 21st. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $378.23.

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.