Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. Buys Shares of 5,278 Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. bought a new stake in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) during the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor bought 5,278 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $1,866,000.

Several other hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Sound Income Strategies LLC raised its position in shares of Accenture by 10.1% during the second quarter. Sound Income Strategies LLC now owns 383 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $116,000 after purchasing an additional 35 shares during the period. Mechanics Bank Trust Department raised its position in shares of Accenture by 24.6% during the second quarter. Mechanics Bank Trust Department now owns 735 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $223,000 after purchasing an additional 145 shares during the period. RFG Advisory LLC raised its position in shares of Accenture by 22.3% during the second quarter. RFG Advisory LLC now owns 3,863 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,172,000 after purchasing an additional 704 shares during the period. Park National Corp OH raised its position in shares of Accenture by 19.3% during the second quarter. Park National Corp OH now owns 150,603 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $45,694,000 after purchasing an additional 24,397 shares during the period. Finally, D.B. Root & Company LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Accenture during the second quarter worth about $228,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Trading Up 1.3 %

Shares of NYSE ACN opened at $362.70 on Friday. Accenture plc has a 12 month low of $278.69 and a 12 month high of $387.51. The stock has a 50 day moving average of $360.14 and a 200-day moving average of $332.86. The company has a market capitalization of $226.75 billion, a P/E ratio of 31.73, a P/E/G ratio of 3.19 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 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.78 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $16.41 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $16.37 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.83% and a net margin of 11.20%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 2.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $2.71 EPS. Analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 12.76 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture declared that its board has approved a share repurchase program on Thursday, September 26th that allows the company to buyback $4.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization allows the information technology services provider to buy up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback programs are generally a sign that the company’s board believes its shares are undervalued.

Accenture Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, October 10th were issued a dividend of $1.48 per share. This is a boost from Accenture’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.29. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.63%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, October 10th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 51.79%.

Insider Buying and Selling

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

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts have recently commented on the company. Royal Bank of Canada raised their price target on Accenture from $377.00 to $389.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. The Goldman Sachs Group raised Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their target price for the company from $370.00 to $420.00 in a research report on Friday. Guggenheim lifted their target price on Accenture from $380.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. StockNews.com lowered Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 24th. Finally, UBS Group lifted their target price on Accenture from $400.00 to $415.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. Nine investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fourteen have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $372.09.

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.