Johnson Financial Group Inc. Cuts Stock Position in Accenture PLC $ACN

Johnson Financial Group Inc. decreased its holdings in Accenture PLC (NYSE:ACN) by 8.5% in the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 20,992 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 1,961 shares during the quarter. Johnson Financial Group Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $6,274,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other large investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Kelly Lawrence W & Associates Inc. CA acquired a new position in shares of Accenture in the first quarter worth $31,000. RMG Wealth Management LLC purchased a new position in Accenture in the second quarter valued at $33,000. WPG Advisers LLC acquired a new position in Accenture during the 1st quarter worth $42,000. Cheviot Value Management LLC purchased a new stake in Accenture during the 1st quarter worth about $43,000. Finally, Fiduciary Wealth Partners LLC acquired a new stake in Accenture in the 1st quarter valued at about $45,000. 75.14% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Accenture news, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 2,500 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, October 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $249.47, for a total transaction of $623,675.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 1,390 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $346,763.30. The trade was a 64.27% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, insider Manish Sharma sold 6,902 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, October 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $250.01, for a total value of $1,725,569.02. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 1,860 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $465,018.60. The trade was a 78.77% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders have sold 33,319 shares of company stock worth $8,335,225 in the last quarter. 0.02% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Accenture Stock Down 0.5%

Shares of NYSE:ACN opened at $247.91 on Thursday. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $244.81 and a 200-day simple moving average of $269.66. Accenture PLC has a twelve month low of $229.40 and a twelve month high of $398.35. The company has a current ratio of 1.42, a quick ratio of 1.42 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16. The company has a market capitalization of $163.24 billion, a PE ratio of 20.40, a P/E/G ratio of 2.16 and a beta of 1.28.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, September 25th. The information technology services provider reported $3.03 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.98 by $0.05. Accenture had a net margin of 11.02% and a return on equity of 26.45%. The firm had revenue of $17.60 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $17.34 billion. During the same period last year, the firm posted $2.66 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 7.3% on a year-over-year basis. Accenture has set its FY 2026 guidance at 13.190-13.570 EPS. Q1 2026 guidance at EPS. On average, equities analysts predict that Accenture PLC will post 12.73 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 14th. Stockholders of record on Friday, October 10th were issued a $1.63 dividend. This represents a $6.52 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.6%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, October 10th. This is an increase from Accenture’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.48. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 53.66%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

ACN has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. TD Cowen lowered their price objective on Accenture from $313.00 to $295.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, September 26th. Wall Street Zen cut shares of Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Saturday, October 11th. Wolfe Research raised their price objective on shares of Accenture from $285.00 to $300.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 22nd. The Goldman Sachs Group decreased their price objective on shares of Accenture from $370.00 to $330.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, September 26th. Finally, Susquehanna lowered their target price on shares of Accenture from $330.00 to $270.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, September 18th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, fifteen have given a Buy rating, eleven have assigned a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $294.25.

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.