Mizuho Issues Pessimistic Forecast for Accenture (NYSE:ACN) Stock Price

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) had its target price reduced by Mizuho from $428.00 to $398.00 in a research report released on Wednesday morning,Benzinga reports. They currently have an outperform rating on the information technology services provider’s stock.

Several other research analysts have also recently weighed in on the company. Baird R W upgraded Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Monday. UBS Group boosted their price objective on shares of Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. Robert W. Baird raised shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $390.00 target price on the stock in a report on Monday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their price target on Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, December 16th. Finally, Piper Sandler lowered their price objective on Accenture from $429.00 to $396.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, March 14th. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, Accenture presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $384.45.

Accenture Stock Performance

NYSE ACN opened at $324.52 on Wednesday. Accenture has a 52-week low of $278.69 and a 52-week high of $398.35. The stock has a market cap of $203.08 billion, a PE ratio of 27.22, a P/E/G ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $361.19 and a 200-day moving average of $357.78. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a current ratio of 1.47.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.43 by $0.16. The company had revenue of $17.69 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $17.15 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The business’s revenue was up 9.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $3.27 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Accenture will post 12.73 EPS for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Accenture news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 232 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $394.46, for a total value of $91,514.72. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 8,915 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,516,610.90. The trade was a 2.54 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, CFO Angie Y. Park sold 685 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.38, for a total value of $242,750.30. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 8,674 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,073,892.12. This trade represents a 7.32 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 22,280 shares of company stock valued at $8,316,190 in the last 90 days. Corporate insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the company. Baldwin Wealth Partners LLC MA lifted its holdings in Accenture by 6.5% in the fourth quarter. Baldwin Wealth Partners LLC MA now owns 63,429 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $22,314,000 after buying an additional 3,883 shares during the period. Davidson Trust Co. boosted its position in shares of Accenture by 7.4% during the 4th quarter. Davidson Trust Co. now owns 2,307 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $812,000 after purchasing an additional 158 shares in the last quarter. Franklin Street Advisors Inc. NC grew its stake in Accenture by 126.8% during the fourth quarter. Franklin Street Advisors Inc. NC now owns 40,051 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $14,090,000 after purchasing an additional 22,391 shares during the period. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its stake 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 valued at $1,705,100,000 after buying an additional 56,937 shares during the period. Finally, China Universal Asset Management Co. Ltd. boosted its holdings in shares of Accenture by 37.5% during the 4th quarter. China Universal Asset Management Co. Ltd. now owns 3,094 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,088,000 after buying an additional 843 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

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.