Montag A & Associates Inc. Increases Stock Holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Montag A & Associates Inc. grew its position in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 1.5% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 9,908 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 150 shares during the period. Montag A & Associates Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $3,477,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Chilton Capital Management LLC increased its position in shares of Accenture by 180.0% in the fourth quarter. Chilton Capital Management LLC now owns 70 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $25,000 after purchasing an additional 45 shares during the last quarter. DiNuzzo Private Wealth Inc. bought a new position in Accenture in the fourth quarter valued at $27,000. Halpern Financial Inc. bought a new stake in Accenture during the fourth quarter worth about $31,000. Valued Wealth Advisors LLC bought a new position in shares of Accenture during the 4th quarter valued at about $50,000. Finally, Valley National Advisers Inc. lifted its position in Accenture by 40.3% in the 3rd quarter. Valley National Advisers Inc. now owns 167 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $51,000 after buying an additional 48 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Insider Transactions at Accenture

In other Accenture news, insider Ellyn Shook sold 5,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, April 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $307.22, for a total value of $1,536,100.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now owns 13,699 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,208,606.78. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. In other news, insider Ellyn Shook sold 5,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, April 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $307.22, for a total transaction of $1,536,100.00. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 13,699 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,208,606.78. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, General Counsel Joel Unruch sold 4,333 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction on Friday, April 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $316.12, for a total value of $1,369,747.96. Following the completion of the sale, the general counsel now directly owns 30,702 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $9,705,516.24. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 28,083 shares of company stock worth $8,959,325 over the last quarter. 0.07% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts have recently weighed in on the stock. Mizuho restated a “buy” rating and issued a $398.00 price objective (down from $426.00) on shares of Accenture in a report on Friday, March 22nd. Susquehanna reiterated a “neutral” rating and issued a $360.00 price objective (down previously from $400.00) on shares of Accenture in a report on Thursday, March 21st. Piper Sandler raised their price target on Accenture from $335.00 to $394.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Monday, March 18th. StockNews.com lowered Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Saturday, April 27th. Finally, Robert W. Baird upped their price target on shares of Accenture from $364.00 to $375.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, March 7th. 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, Accenture presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $387.00.

Accenture Stock Performance

Shares of ACN traded down $5.43 during mid-day trading on Thursday, reaching $306.56. The company had a trading volume of 3,238,071 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,507,225. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $338.85 and a 200 day moving average price of $342.14. The company has a market capitalization of $205.62 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 27.80, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.88 and a beta of 1.21. Accenture plc has a 52 week low of $264.42 and a 52 week high of $387.51.

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

Accenture Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, April 11th will be paid a dividend of $1.29 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, April 10th. This represents a $5.16 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.68%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is 46.78%.

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.