Cypress Wealth Services LLC Has $409,000 Stock Position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Cypress Wealth Services LLC lowered its stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 2.5% in the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The institutional investor owned 1,162 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 30 shares during the period. Cypress Wealth Services LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $409,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

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

Insider Transactions at Accenture

In related news, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the firm’s 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 owns 6 shares in the company, valued at $2,062.20. This trade represents a 99.81 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 9,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, October 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $376.16, for a total value of $3,385,440.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 20,324 shares in the company, valued at approximately $7,645,075.84. The trade was a 30.69 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 26,125 shares of company stock valued at $9,570,260. Corporate insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research firms have recently issued reports on ACN. Bank of America upped their price objective on Accenture from $365.00 to $388.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price target on shares of Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, December 16th. Wolfe Research raised 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 note on Wednesday, January 8th. BMO Capital Markets upped their price target on shares of Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research note on Friday, December 20th. Finally, Piper Sandler Companies reiterated a “neutral” rating and set a $329.00 target price on shares of Accenture in a research note on Friday, September 20th. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $385.04.

Accenture Stock Performance

Shares of Accenture stock opened at $350.92 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 1.47, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17. Accenture plc has a 12 month low of $278.69 and a 12 month high of $387.51. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $357.85 and its 200-day moving average price is $344.97. The firm has a market cap of $219.60 billion, a P/E ratio of 29.44, a P/E/G ratio of 3.11 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. The company had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.15 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. Accenture’s revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last 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 declared that its Board of Directors has initiated a stock buyback plan 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 plans are often an indication that the company’s leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be given a $1.48 dividend. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.69%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, January 16th. Accenture’s payout ratio is currently 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.