GHP Investment Advisors Inc. Boosts Stake in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

GHP Investment Advisors Inc. increased its holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 4.5% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 21,213 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 906 shares during the period. GHP Investment Advisors Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $7,463,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the business. Masso Torrence Wealth Management Inc. raised its stake in shares of Accenture by 2.0% during the 3rd quarter. Masso Torrence Wealth Management Inc. now owns 1,447 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $511,000 after purchasing an additional 28 shares during the period. BSW Wealth Partners boosted its stake in Accenture by 0.7% in the third quarter. BSW Wealth Partners now owns 4,077 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,441,000 after acquiring an additional 28 shares during the last quarter. Slow Capital Inc. increased its stake in shares of Accenture by 0.3% during the 3rd quarter. Slow Capital Inc. now owns 9,067 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $3,205,000 after purchasing an additional 29 shares during the last quarter. Tradition Wealth Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of Accenture by 0.3% in the 3rd quarter. Tradition Wealth Management LLC now owns 10,951 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $3,871,000 after purchasing an additional 29 shares during the period. Finally, NBC Securities Inc. grew its holdings in Accenture by 0.6% during the third quarter. NBC Securities Inc. now owns 5,206 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,840,000 after purchasing an additional 30 shares during the period. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Insider Activity

In related news, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total transaction of $134,437.50. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 5,149 shares in the company, valued at $1,845,916.50. This represents a 6.79 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 1,487 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, January 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.54, for a total value of $527,200.98. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 9,247 shares in the company, valued at $3,278,431.38. This trade represents a 13.85 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders sold 13,255 shares of company stock valued at $4,756,101. Corporate insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of research analysts have recently commented on the company. Piper Sandler upped their price target on Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Wolfe Research upgraded shares of Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 target price for the company in a research report on Wednesday, January 8th. The Goldman Sachs Group raised shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and boosted their price target for the company from $370.00 to $420.00 in a research report on Friday, December 6th. Jefferies Financial Group cut their price objective on shares of Accenture from $385.00 to $355.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, January 21st. Finally, Robert W. Baird restated a “neutral” rating and set a $370.00 target price on shares of Accenture in a research report on Tuesday, December 3rd. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have given a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, Accenture presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $387.22.

Accenture Stock Performance

Accenture stock opened at $397.92 on Thursday. Accenture plc has a fifty-two week low of $278.69 and a fifty-two week high of $398.35. The firm’s fifty day moving average price is $361.34 and its 200-day moving average price is $351.40. The stock has a market cap of $249.01 billion, a P/E ratio of 33.38, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.43 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 (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. The firm had revenue of $17.69 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.15 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The company’s revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $3.27 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts expect that Accenture plc will post 12.69 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be paid a dividend of $1.48 per share. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.49%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, January 16th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 49.66%.

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.