ZWJ Investment Counsel Inc. Grows Holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

ZWJ Investment Counsel Inc. grew its position in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 1.5% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 61,133 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after buying an additional 933 shares during the quarter. ZWJ Investment Counsel Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $21,452,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

A number of other large investors also recently bought and sold shares of ACN. Chilton Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 180.0% during the fourth quarter. Chilton Capital Management LLC now owns 70 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $25,000 after buying an additional 45 shares in the last quarter. Strategic Investment Solutions Inc. IL acquired a new stake in Accenture in the first quarter valued at $28,000. BluePath Capital Management LLC bought a new stake in Accenture during the third quarter valued at $31,000. Halpern Financial Inc. bought a new stake in Accenture during the fourth quarter valued at $31,000. Finally, RVW Wealth LLC bought a new stake in Accenture during the third quarter valued at $33,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Stock Up 0.3 %

Accenture stock traded up $0.88 during midday trading on Friday, reaching $316.88. The stock had a trading volume of 3,381,158 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,390,528. The firm has a market cap of $212.54 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 28.73, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.98 and a beta of 1.19. The company has a fifty day moving average of $355.21 and a 200 day moving average of $341.83. Accenture plc has a 52-week low of $261.68 and a 52-week high of $387.51.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, March 21st. The information technology services provider reported $2.77 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.66 by $0.11. Accenture had a net margin of 10.89% and a return on equity of 28.30%. The company had revenue of $15.80 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $15.85 billion. During the same period last year, the company posted $2.69 earnings per share. Accenture’s revenue was down .1% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities research analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 12.09 EPS for the current year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, May 15th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, April 11th will be paid a dividend of $1.29 per share. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, April 10th. This represents a $5.16 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.63%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is currently 46.78%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

ACN has been the subject of several research analyst reports. BNP Paribas raised shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $440.00 price objective for the company in a report on Wednesday, January 17th. Piper Sandler increased their price target on Accenture from $335.00 to $394.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Monday, March 18th. TD Cowen reduced their price objective on Accenture from $363.00 to $350.00 and set a “market perform” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, March 22nd. Mizuho reiterated a “buy” rating and set a $398.00 price objective (down from $426.00) on shares of Accenture in a research note on Friday, March 22nd. Finally, StockNews.com lowered Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, March 22nd. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Accenture has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $387.00.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CFO Kathleen R. Mcclure sold 4,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, April 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $316.00, for a total value of $1,422,000.00. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 42,781 shares in the company, valued at approximately $13,518,796. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. In related news, CFO Kathleen R. Mcclure sold 4,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, April 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $316.00, for a total transaction of $1,422,000.00. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 42,781 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $13,518,796. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, insider Ellyn Shook sold 5,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, January 26th. The shares were sold at an average price of $371.81, for a total transaction of $1,859,050.00. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 20,316 shares in the company, valued at $7,553,691.96. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 35,500 shares of company stock worth $12,276,123. 0.07% of the stock is owned by insiders.

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.