Praetorian Wealth Management Inc. Purchases Shares of 991 Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Praetorian Wealth Management Inc. bought a new position in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund bought 991 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $349,000.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in the business. ORG Wealth Partners LLC increased its position in shares of Accenture by 8.4% during the fourth quarter. ORG Wealth Partners LLC now owns 1,340 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $472,000 after acquiring an additional 104 shares in the last quarter. Franklin Street Advisors Inc. NC boosted its holdings in Accenture by 126.8% during the fourth quarter. Franklin Street Advisors Inc. NC now owns 40,051 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $14,090,000 after purchasing an additional 22,391 shares during the last quarter. Hilltop National Bank boosted its holdings in Accenture by 6.6% during the fourth quarter. Hilltop National Bank now owns 1,283 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $451,000 after purchasing an additional 79 shares during the last quarter. ORG Partners LLC boosted its holdings in Accenture by 103.0% during the fourth quarter. ORG Partners LLC now owns 871 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $307,000 after purchasing an additional 442 shares during the last quarter. Finally, First Hawaiian Bank boosted its holdings in Accenture by 14.4% during the fourth quarter. First Hawaiian Bank now owns 2,444 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $860,000 after purchasing an additional 307 shares during the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Accenture Stock Performance

NYSE:ACN traded down $7.90 during trading hours on Friday, reaching $349.83. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 1,272,400 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,455,690. The firm has a market capitalization of $218.92 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.61, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $357.74 and a 200-day simple moving average of $343.47. Accenture plc has a 1 year low of $278.69 and a 1 year high of $387.51.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.43 by $0.16. The business had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.15 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.20% and a return on equity of 26.83%. The company’s revenue was up 9.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $3.27 EPS. Equities analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 12.74 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be issued a $1.48 dividend. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.69%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, January 16th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 49.66%.

Accenture declared that its Board of Directors has initiated a stock repurchase program on Thursday, September 26th that permits the company to repurchase $4.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization permits the information technology services provider to purchase up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are typically a sign that the company’s board believes its shares are undervalued.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research analysts recently weighed in on the stock. BMO Capital Markets boosted their price target on shares of Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. Royal Bank of Canada boosted their target price on shares of Accenture from $377.00 to $389.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, September 27th. Robert W. Baird restated a “neutral” rating and set a $370.00 price target on shares of Accenture in a research note on Tuesday, December 3rd. Citigroup upped their price target on shares of Accenture from $350.00 to $405.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, September 17th. Finally, Piper Sandler upped 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. Nine research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Accenture presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $385.04.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $343.70, for a total transaction of $1,096,746.70. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 6 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,062.20. The trade was a 99.81 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 673 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, October 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $372.18, for a total transaction of $250,477.14. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 5,650 shares in the company, valued at $2,102,817. The trade was a 10.64 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 36,673 shares of company stock valued at $13,507,099 in the last quarter. Insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Accenture 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.