Stock Yards Bank & Trust Co. Boosts Position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Stock Yards Bank & Trust Co. lifted its holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 1.0% in the 2nd quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 103,798 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 1,075 shares during the period. Accenture makes up 1.0% of Stock Yards Bank & Trust Co.’s portfolio, making the stock its 29th biggest position. Stock Yards Bank & Trust Co.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $31,493,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in the company. Edgestream Partners L.P. acquired a new stake in shares of Accenture in the second quarter valued at about $1,524,000. Moors & Cabot Inc. raised its stake in shares of Accenture by 1.3% during the second quarter. Moors & Cabot Inc. now owns 27,632 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $8,384,000 after purchasing an additional 354 shares during the period. Luts & Greenleigh Group Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Accenture during the second quarter worth $235,000. Montag & Caldwell LLC boosted its stake in shares of Accenture by 72.9% in the second quarter. Montag & Caldwell LLC now owns 25,808 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $7,830,000 after purchasing an additional 10,882 shares during the period. Finally, Renaissance Technologies LLC purchased a new stake in Accenture during the 2nd quarter worth $125,126,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Insider Activity at Accenture

In related news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 3,776 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, July 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $309.05, for a total transaction of $1,166,972.80. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 11,819 shares in the company, valued at $3,652,661.95. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. In other Accenture news, CFO Kathleen R. Mcclure sold 1,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, July 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $315.00, for a total transaction of $472,500.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 38,570 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $12,149,550. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 3,776 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, July 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $309.05, for a total transaction of $1,166,972.80. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 11,819 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,652,661.95. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 21,421 shares of company stock valued at $6,912,635 over the last 90 days. 0.07% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages have recently weighed in on ACN. Wedbush lowered their target price on Accenture from $400.00 to $350.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, June 12th. Piper Sandler dropped their price target on shares of Accenture from $379.00 to $320.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, June 17th. Bank of America dropped their target price on shares of Accenture from $419.00 to $365.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, June 5th. Guggenheim reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $395.00 price target on shares of Accenture in a research report on Friday, May 24th. Finally, TD Cowen boosted their price objective on Accenture from $293.00 to $321.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, September 12th. Eleven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twelve have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $354.68.

Accenture Trading Up 1.3 %

Shares of NYSE ACN opened at $354.12 on Tuesday. Accenture plc has a 12-month low of $278.69 and a 12-month high of $387.51. The company has a market cap of $221.92 billion, a PE ratio of 32.43, a P/E/G ratio of 3.82 and a beta of 1.24. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $329.17 and a 200-day simple moving average of $322.90.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, June 20th. The information technology services provider reported $3.13 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $3.15 by ($0.02). The business had revenue of $16.47 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $16.55 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 27.48% and a net margin of 10.79%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was down .6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $3.19 EPS. Sell-side analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 11.95 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, August 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, July 11th were paid a dividend of $1.29 per share. This represents a $5.16 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.46%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, July 11th. Accenture’s payout ratio is currently 47.25%.

Accenture 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.