Lakeshore Capital Group Inc. Invests $853,000 in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Lakeshore Capital Group Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) in the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund purchased 2,423 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $853,000. Accenture accounts for approximately 1.3% of Lakeshore Capital Group Inc.’s portfolio, making the stock its 27th largest holding.

Other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Integrated Advisors Network LLC increased its stake in shares of Accenture by 92.6% in the fourth quarter. Integrated Advisors Network LLC now owns 16,585 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $5,834,000 after buying an additional 7,975 shares in the last quarter. Great Valley Advisor Group Inc. grew its holdings in Accenture by 2.7% during the 4th quarter. Great Valley Advisor Group Inc. now owns 35,983 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $12,658,000 after acquiring an additional 935 shares during the last quarter. Ameriflex Group Inc. acquired a new stake in Accenture in the 4th quarter valued at about $75,000. Challenger Wealth Management bought a new position in shares of Accenture in the fourth quarter worth about $928,000. Finally, Ascent Group LLC grew its stake in shares of Accenture by 59.2% during the fourth quarter. Ascent Group LLC now owns 14,932 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $5,253,000 after purchasing an additional 5,550 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Insider Transactions at Accenture

In other Accenture news, insider Angela Beatty sold 169 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction on Friday, April 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $281.90, for a total value of $47,641.10. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 5,364 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,512,111.60. The trade was a 3.05% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, COO John F. Walsh sold 2,500 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, May 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $325.00, for a total transaction of $812,500.00. Following the transaction, the chief operating officer now owns 15,882 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,161,650. This represents a 13.60% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 8,516 shares of company stock valued at $2,507,366 over the last 90 days. 0.02% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research analysts recently weighed in on the stock. Robert W. Baird upgraded shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $390.00 price objective for the company in a research report on Monday, March 17th. Piper Sandler dropped their target price on Accenture from $364.00 to $355.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, April 16th. BMO Capital Markets raised their price target on Accenture to $355.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a report on Wednesday, March 26th. Guggenheim cut their target price on shares of Accenture from $400.00 to $395.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, March 21st. Finally, Morgan Stanley dropped their price target on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $372.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, March 17th. Seven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $382.14.

Accenture Price Performance

NYSE ACN opened at $309.51 on Monday. The stock has a market cap of $193.86 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.97, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.35. Accenture plc has a 52-week low of $275.01 and a 52-week high of $398.35. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a current ratio of 1.47. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $302.06 and a 200 day simple moving average of $339.97.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.81 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $16.70 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $16.64 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 5.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $2.77 earnings per share. Analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, May 15th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, April 10th were issued a $1.48 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, April 10th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.91%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 48.89%.

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.