Accenture (NYSE:ACN) Given New $396.00 Price Target at Piper Sandler

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) had its price target cut by equities research analysts at Piper Sandler from $429.00 to $396.00 in a research note issued on Friday,Benzinga reports. The firm currently has an “overweight” rating on the information technology services provider’s stock. Piper Sandler’s target price points to a potential upside of 25.12% from the stock’s previous close.

Several other research firms have also issued reports on ACN. StockNews.com lowered Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Tuesday. The Goldman Sachs Group upgraded shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their target price for the stock from $370.00 to $420.00 in a research note on Friday, December 6th. Jefferies Financial Group reduced their price target on shares of Accenture from $385.00 to $355.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, January 21st. Wolfe Research raised Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price objective on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, January 8th. Finally, Morgan Stanley boosted their price target on Accenture from $335.00 to $380.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday, January 31st. Nine equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $387.52.

Accenture Trading Down 2.4 %

Shares of NYSE ACN opened at $316.48 on Friday. Accenture has a 1 year low of $278.69 and a 1 year high of $398.35. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.47. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $363.72 and a 200 day moving average of $358.10. The stock has a market cap of $198.05 billion, a P/E ratio of 26.55, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last released its earnings results 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 firm had revenue of $17.69 billion during 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%. The business’s revenue was up 9.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the business earned $3.27 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that Accenture will post 12.73 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity

In related news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 1,487 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction 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 completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 9,247 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,278,431.38. This trade represents a 13.85 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on 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 owns 5,149 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,845,916.50. The trade was a 6.79 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 22,280 shares of company stock worth $8,316,190 over the last ninety days. Corporate insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Accenture

Large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Swedbank AB lifted its position in Accenture by 16.6% during the third quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 2,551,679 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $901,967,000 after purchasing an additional 363,401 shares during the last quarter. Entropy Technologies LP bought a new position in shares of Accenture in the 3rd quarter valued at about $745,000. Harbour Investments Inc. grew its position in Accenture by 14.1% in the third quarter. Harbour Investments Inc. now owns 1,143 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $404,000 after acquiring an additional 141 shares in the last quarter. FUKOKU MUTUAL LIFE INSURANCE Co raised its position in Accenture by 35.6% during the third quarter. FUKOKU MUTUAL LIFE INSURANCE Co now owns 3,349 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,184,000 after purchasing an additional 880 shares during the period. Finally, CIBC Asset Management Inc lifted its stake in shares of Accenture by 8.1% in the 3rd quarter. CIBC Asset Management Inc now owns 111,561 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $39,411,000 after purchasing an additional 8,338 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

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.