Accenture (NYSE:ACN) Upgraded to Overweight by Piper Sandler

Piper Sandler upgraded shares of Accenture (NYSE:ACN) from a neutral rating to an overweight rating in a report published on Thursday morning, Marketbeat Ratings reports. They currently have $395.00 target price on the information technology services provider’s stock, up from their prior target price of $329.00.

ACN has been the topic of several other research reports. Bank of America decreased their target price on Accenture from $419.00 to $365.00 and set a buy rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, June 5th. UBS Group raised shares of Accenture from a neutral rating to a buy rating and set a $400.00 price objective on the stock in a research report on Friday, July 19th. BMO Capital Markets cut their target price on Accenture from $375.00 to $350.00 and set a market perform rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, June 21st. Stifel Nicolaus dropped their target price on shares of Accenture from $395.00 to $340.00 and set a buy rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, June 12th. Finally, TD Cowen lifted their price target on Accenture from $293.00 to $321.00 and gave the stock a hold rating in a research report on Thursday, September 12th. Nine investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fourteen have given a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of Moderate Buy and a consensus target price of $364.64.

Accenture Trading Down 1.7 %

Shares of NYSE ACN opened at $349.70 on Thursday. The company has a 50-day moving average of $333.92 and a 200 day moving average of $320.40. Accenture has a 12-month low of $278.69 and a 12-month high of $387.51. The stock has a market cap of $219.15 billion, a PE ratio of 32.02, a P/E/G ratio of 3.69 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, September 26th. The information technology services provider reported $2.79 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.78 by $0.01. Accenture had a return on equity of 27.48% and a net margin of 10.79%. The company had revenue of $16.41 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $16.37 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $2.71 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 2.6% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Accenture will post 11.95 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, November 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, October 10th will be issued a $1.48 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, October 10th. This is a boost from Accenture’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.29. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.69%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 47.25%.

Accenture announced that its board has authorized a stock buyback plan on Thursday, September 26th that permits the company to repurchase $4.00 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization permits the information technology services provider to reacquire up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are typically a sign that the company’s board believes its shares are undervalued.

Insider Activity

In other news, CFO Kathleen R. Mcclure sold 3,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, July 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $309.22, for a total value of $927,660.00. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 40,070 shares in the company, valued at $12,390,445.40. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. In other Accenture news, CFO Kathleen R. Mcclure sold 3,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, July 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $309.22, for a total transaction of $927,660.00. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 40,070 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $12,390,445.40. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 3,776 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, July 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $309.05, for a total value 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 disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 21,421 shares of company stock worth $6,912,635 over the last ninety days. 0.07% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in ACN. Anchor Investment Management LLC lifted its position in Accenture by 1.1% during the second quarter. Anchor Investment Management LLC now owns 5,661 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,718,000 after buying an additional 61 shares in the last quarter. Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan Trust Fund raised its holdings in Accenture by 38.0% in the second quarter. Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan Trust Fund now owns 379,060 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $115,011,000 after acquiring an additional 104,325 shares in the last quarter. Verity & Verity LLC lifted its position in shares of Accenture by 8.0% during the second quarter. Verity & Verity LLC now owns 5,216 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,583,000 after purchasing an additional 387 shares during the last quarter. Cim LLC lifted its holdings in Accenture by 9.6% during the 2nd quarter. Cim LLC now owns 6,887 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $2,090,000 after buying an additional 604 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Sanctuary Advisors LLC acquired a new position in Accenture in the second quarter worth $27,862,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

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.