Wealthcare Advisory Partners LLC Has $1.52 Million Holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Wealthcare Advisory Partners LLC lifted its position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 41.4% in the first quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 4,864 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 1,424 shares during the quarter. Wealthcare Advisory Partners LLC’s holdings in Accenture were worth $1,518,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of ACN. Signet Financial Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Accenture during the 1st quarter worth about $823,000. Octavia Wealth Advisors LLC lifted its stake in Accenture by 17.8% during the first quarter. Octavia Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 703 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $219,000 after purchasing an additional 106 shares during the period. Pallas Capital Advisors LLC boosted its holdings in Accenture by 7.1% during the first quarter. Pallas Capital Advisors LLC now owns 19,973 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $6,232,000 after purchasing an additional 1,323 shares in the last quarter. Patrick M Sweeney & Associates Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Accenture by 2.5% in the 1st quarter. Patrick M Sweeney & Associates Inc. now owns 2,019 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $630,000 after buying an additional 50 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Daymark Wealth Partners LLC lifted its position in shares of Accenture by 0.7% during the 1st quarter. Daymark Wealth Partners LLC now owns 5,891 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,838,000 after buying an additional 41 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

ACN has been the topic of a number of analyst reports. Baird R W upgraded Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Monday, March 17th. Robert W. Baird upgraded shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $390.00 price target on the stock in a research report on Monday, March 17th. Guggenheim dropped their price objective on shares of Accenture from $400.00 to $395.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Friday, March 21st. Stifel Nicolaus reduced their target price on Accenture from $390.00 to $380.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, February 26th. Finally, Piper Sandler dropped their price target on Accenture from $364.00 to $355.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, April 16th. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $382.14.

Insider Buying and Selling at Accenture

In other Accenture news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 2,284 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, April 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $281.63, for a total value of $643,242.92. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 9,965 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,806,442.95. This trade represents a 18.65% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, COO John F. Walsh sold 2,500 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction on 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 directly owns 15,882 shares in the company, 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. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 8,516 shares of company stock valued at $2,507,366. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Accenture Price Performance

Shares of ACN stock opened at $319.20 on Thursday. The firm has a market cap of $199.92 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.78, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.33. Accenture plc has a 12 month low of $275.01 and a 12 month high of $398.35. The company has a quick ratio of 1.47, a current ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $304.23 and a 200 day moving average price of $336.42.

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, topping the consensus estimate of $2.81 by $0.01. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The company had revenue of $16.70 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $16.64 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $2.77 EPS. Accenture’s revenue was up 5.7% on a year-over-year basis. Research analysts expect that Accenture plc will post 12.73 EPS for the current year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, May 15th. Investors 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 yield of 1.85%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is presently 48.89%.

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.