Capital Planning Advisors LLC Has $3.94 Million Stock Position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Capital Planning Advisors LLC raised its holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 15.2% during the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 11,187 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 1,472 shares during the period. Capital Planning Advisors LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $3,935,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Other large investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Evergreen Capital Management LLC boosted its position in shares of Accenture by 4.2% during the 2nd quarter. Evergreen Capital Management LLC now owns 6,517 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,977,000 after acquiring an additional 263 shares in the last quarter. Fred Alger Management LLC lifted its position in shares of Accenture by 2.8% during the 2nd quarter. Fred Alger Management LLC now owns 3,413 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,036,000 after buying an additional 94 shares during the period. Alpha DNA Investment Management LLC grew its position in Accenture by 20.7% in the second quarter. Alpha DNA Investment Management LLC now owns 3,189 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $968,000 after acquiring an additional 547 shares during the period. Alley Investment Management Company LLC grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 7.0% in the 2nd quarter. Alley Investment Management Company LLC now owns 54,612 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $16,570,000 after purchasing an additional 3,563 shares during the last quarter. Finally, AXA S.A. lifted its holdings in Accenture by 17.6% during the 2nd quarter. AXA S.A. now owns 508,839 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $154,387,000 after purchasing an additional 76,317 shares during the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research analysts have recently commented on ACN shares. TD Cowen raised Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and boosted their target price for the stock from $321.00 to $400.00 in a report on Monday, September 30th. BMO Capital Markets increased their target price on Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. Piper Sandler increased their price target on shares of Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. Robert W. Baird reiterated a “neutral” rating and issued a $370.00 price objective on shares of Accenture in a research report on Tuesday, December 3rd. Finally, StockNews.com upgraded Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, January 13th. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $383.74.

Accenture Price Performance

Shares of NYSE ACN opened at $359.08 on Thursday. The stock has a market cap of $224.71 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.12, a PEG ratio of 3.17 and a beta of 1.24. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a current ratio of 1.47. Accenture plc has a fifty-two week low of $278.69 and a fifty-two week high of $387.51. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $357.18 and its 200 day simple moving average is $346.75.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The firm had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $3.27 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 12.69 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be issued a dividend of $1.48 per share. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.65%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, January 16th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 49.66%.

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

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 1,487 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, January 21st. The shares were 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. This represents a 13.85 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 2,497 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred 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 transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 28,866 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $10,232,419.68. This represents a 7.96 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 17,332 shares of company stock valued at $6,172,719 over the last ninety days. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

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.