Nichols & Pratt Advisers LLP MA Lowers Position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Nichols & Pratt Advisers LLP MA lessened its stake in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 0.4% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 79,277 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 355 shares during the period. Accenture comprises approximately 2.0% of Nichols & Pratt Advisers LLP MA’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 19th largest holding. Nichols & Pratt Advisers LLP MA’s holdings in Accenture were worth $27,819,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the stock. Chilton Capital Management LLC increased its stake in shares of Accenture by 180.0% in the 4th quarter. Chilton Capital Management LLC now owns 70 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $25,000 after acquiring an additional 45 shares during the last quarter. DiNuzzo Private Wealth Inc. purchased a new position in Accenture during the 4th quarter valued at about $27,000. BluePath Capital Management LLC purchased a new position in Accenture during the 3rd quarter valued at about $31,000. Halpern Financial Inc. purchased a new position in Accenture during the 4th quarter valued at about $31,000. Finally, Valued Wealth Advisors LLC purchased a new position in Accenture during the 4th quarter valued at about $50,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities analysts have recently issued reports on ACN shares. Guggenheim started coverage on Accenture in a research note on Tuesday, March 19th. They issued a “buy” rating and a $425.00 price objective for the company. Citigroup decreased their price objective on Accenture from $430.00 to $400.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, March 22nd. BNP Paribas raised Accenture from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $440.00 target price on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, January 17th. StockNews.com lowered Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Saturday, April 27th. Finally, UBS Group raised their target price on Accenture from $365.00 to $400.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 25th. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $387.00.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Accenture news, insider Ellyn Shook sold 5,000 shares of the business’s 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 sale, the insider now directly owns 13,699 shares in the company, valued at $4,208,606.78. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. In other news, COO John F. Walsh sold 8,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, March 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $332.13, for a total value of $2,657,040.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief operating officer now directly owns 17,877 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,937,488.01. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, insider Ellyn Shook sold 5,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, April 25th. The shares were 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 $4,208,606.78. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders have sold 28,083 shares of company stock worth $8,959,325. 0.07% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Accenture Price Performance

Shares of NYSE:ACN traded up $0.29 during trading on Friday, reaching $306.90. The company had a trading volume of 713,293 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,487,076. Accenture plc has a fifty-two week low of $268.18 and a fifty-two week high of $387.51. The firm has a market capitalization of $205.85 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 27.89, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.88 and a beta of 1.21. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $337.50 and its 200 day moving average price is $341.89.

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

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, April 11th will be given 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 yield of 1.68%. Accenture’s 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.