Accenture (NYSE:ACN) Price Target Raised to $385.00

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) had its price objective increased by Jefferies Financial Group from $355.00 to $385.00 in a research report sent to investors on Friday morning,Benzinga reports. Jefferies Financial Group currently has a hold rating on the information technology services provider’s stock.

Other research analysts have also issued reports about the stock. Mizuho raised their price objective on shares of Accenture from $352.00 to $365.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, September 18th. StockNews.com raised Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, December 9th. Piper Sandler boosted their price target on Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday. Barclays lifted their price objective on shares of Accenture from $350.00 to $415.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, September 30th. Finally, Bank of America increased their target price on shares of Accenture from $365.00 to $388.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. Nine equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fourteen have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $383.23.

Accenture Price Performance

Shares of ACN opened at $366.37 on Friday. Accenture has a 12 month low of $278.69 and a 12 month high of $387.51. The stock has a market cap of $229.04 billion, a PE ratio of 32.05, a P/E/G ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $360.47 and its two-hundred day moving average is $337.49.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a net margin of 11.20% and a return on equity of 26.83%. The business had revenue of $17.69 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $17.15 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $3.27 earnings per share. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, research analysts anticipate that Accenture will post 12.74 earnings per share for the current year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be paid a dividend of $1.48 per share. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.62%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, January 16th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is presently 49.66%.

Accenture announced that its board has initiated a share buyback plan on Thursday, September 26th that permits the company to buyback $4.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization permits the information technology services provider to reacquire up to 1.8% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are usually a sign that the company’s board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

Insider Activity at Accenture

In related news, insider Angela Beatty sold 673 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, October 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $372.18, for a total transaction of $250,477.14. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 5,650 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,102,817. This trade represents a 10.64 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CFO Kathleen R. Mcclure sold 5,090 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, October 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $373.22, for a total value of $1,899,689.80. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 38,825 shares in the company, valued at $14,490,266.50. This represents a 11.59 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders sold 36,298 shares of company stock worth $13,372,661. 0.07% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of ACN. State Street Corp raised its position in shares of Accenture by 1.8% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 27,400,836 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $9,685,648,000 after buying an additional 471,792 shares during the last quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA lifted its position in shares of Accenture by 1.2% in the 2nd quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 10,912,962 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $3,311,102,000 after acquiring an additional 131,544 shares during the period. Legal & General Group Plc increased its position in shares of Accenture by 1.4% during the second quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 5,887,266 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,786,256,000 after purchasing an additional 80,514 shares during the period. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC raised its stake in shares of Accenture by 378.9% in the third quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 5,491,736 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,941,219,000 after purchasing an additional 4,345,039 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its position in Accenture by 1.2% in the third quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 4,823,754 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,705,100,000 after purchasing an additional 56,937 shares during the period. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

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.