Share Buyback Plan Initiated by Accenture (NYSE:ACN)

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) announced that its board has initiated a stock buyback program on Thursday, September 26th, RTT News reports. The company plans to buyback $4.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization permits the information technology services provider to purchase up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback programs are often a sign that the company’s board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities research analysts have recently issued reports on ACN shares. Barclays decreased their price objective on Accenture from $390.00 to $350.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, June 17th. Mizuho upped their price objective on shares of Accenture from $352.00 to $365.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, September 18th. The Goldman Sachs Group began coverage on shares of Accenture in a research report on Monday, June 24th. They issued a “neutral” rating and a $335.00 target price on the stock. Bank of America cut their price target on shares of Accenture from $419.00 to $365.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, June 5th. Finally, Wedbush dropped their price objective on Accenture from $400.00 to $350.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, June 12th. Ten equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have given a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Accenture has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $359.14.

Accenture Price Performance

NYSE:ACN opened at $355.81 on Friday. Accenture has a 12-month low of $278.69 and a 12-month high of $387.51. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $332.96 and a 200 day simple moving average of $321.15. The firm has a market capitalization of $222.98 billion, a P/E ratio of 32.58, a P/E/G ratio of 3.69 and a beta of 1.24.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CFO Kathleen R. Mcclure sold 3,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, July 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $309.22, for a total value of $927,660.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 40,070 shares in the company, valued at $12,390,445.40. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. In other Accenture news, insider Ellyn Shook sold 5,000 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, July 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $329.82, for a total value of $1,649,100.00. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 8,989 shares in the company, valued at $2,964,751.98. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, CFO Kathleen R. Mcclure sold 3,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, July 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $309.22, for a total value of $927,660.00. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 40,070 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $12,390,445.40. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders sold 21,421 shares of company stock worth $6,912,635. 0.07% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

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.