Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) Shares Acquired by Middleton & Co. Inc. MA

Middleton & Co. Inc. MA lifted its position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 7.0% in the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 1,675 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 110 shares during the quarter. Middleton & Co. Inc. MA’s holdings in Accenture were worth $589,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Several other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of ACN. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC raised its stake in shares of Accenture by 378.9% in the third quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 5,491,736 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,941,219,000 after purchasing an additional 4,345,039 shares during the last quarter. Swedbank AB raised its position in Accenture by 47.5% during the fourth quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 3,763,690 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,324,029,000 after acquiring an additional 1,212,011 shares in the last quarter. Proficio Capital Partners LLC raised its position in Accenture by 51,837.3% during the fourth quarter. Proficio Capital Partners LLC now owns 860,601 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $302,751,000 after acquiring an additional 858,944 shares in the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. lifted its stake in shares of Accenture by 2,666.5% in the 4th quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 715,219 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $251,607,000 after purchasing an additional 689,366 shares during the period. Finally, Holocene Advisors LP acquired a new position in shares of Accenture in the 3rd quarter valued at $204,895,000. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts recently issued reports on ACN shares. The Goldman Sachs Group upgraded shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and boosted their target price for the company from $370.00 to $420.00 in a research note on Friday, December 6th. BMO Capital Markets boosted their target price on shares of Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research note on Friday, December 20th. Robert W. Baird reiterated a “neutral” rating and issued a $370.00 target price on shares of Accenture in a research note on Tuesday, December 3rd. Piper Sandler boosted their target price 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. Finally, Morgan Stanley boosted their price target on shares of Accenture from $335.00 to $380.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, January 31st. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $388.96.

Insider Buying and Selling at Accenture

In other news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 232 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $394.46, for a total transaction of $91,514.72. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 8,915 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,516,610.90. This represents a 2.54 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $394.47, for a total transaction of $3,468,574.71. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 11,858 shares in the company, valued at $4,677,625.26. This represents a 42.58 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 22,280 shares of company stock valued at $8,316,190 over the last 90 days. 0.02% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Accenture Trading Down 2.4 %

Shares of ACN stock opened at $348.28 on Friday. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $367.28 and its 200-day moving average price is $357.56. The company has a current ratio of 1.47, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17. The stock has a market cap of $217.95 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.22, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. Accenture plc has a twelve month low of $278.69 and a twelve month high of $398.35.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. The firm had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $17.15 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. 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 EPS. As a group, equities analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current year.

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.