Northern Trust Corp Raises Stock Holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Northern Trust Corp increased its stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN - Free Report) by 10.7% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 7,582,344 shares of the information technology services provider's stock after purchasing an additional 732,769 shares during the quarter. Northern Trust Corp owned 1.21% of Accenture worth $2,667,393,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of ACN. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its stake in shares of Accenture by 0.7% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 60,394,657 shares of the information technology services provider's stock worth $21,246,236,000 after acquiring an additional 392,183 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Accenture by 1.0% in the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 13,528,348 shares of the information technology services provider's stock valued at $4,750,021,000 after buying an additional 136,665 shares during the period. Capital Research Global Investors boosted its stake in shares of Accenture by 16.8% in the fourth quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 12,295,748 shares of the information technology services provider's stock valued at $4,325,526,000 after buying an additional 1,770,024 shares in the last quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP raised its position in Accenture by 22.8% in the fourth quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 12,175,518 shares of the information technology services provider's stock worth $4,283,225,000 after acquiring an additional 2,260,740 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Capital International Investors boosted its position in shares of Accenture by 2.2% during the 4th quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 8,513,140 shares of the information technology services provider's stock worth $2,994,922,000 after purchasing an additional 181,449 shares in the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several brokerages recently commented on ACN. Royal Bank of Canada reduced their price objective on shares of Accenture from $399.00 to $392.00 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a research note on Friday, March 21st. BMO Capital Markets raised their price objective on Accenture to $355.00 and gave the company a "hold" rating in a research note on Wednesday, March 26th. StockNews.com downgraded Accenture from a "buy" rating to a "hold" rating in a research report on Tuesday, March 11th. Barclays cut their price target on Accenture from $415.00 to $390.00 and set an "overweight" rating for the company in a research note on Monday, March 24th. Finally, Robert W. Baird upgraded shares of Accenture from a "neutral" rating to an "outperform" rating and set a $390.00 target price for the company in a research report on Monday, March 17th. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $377.82.

Accenture Trading Up 0.5 %

ACN stock traded up $1.64 on Thursday, hitting $300.79. 2,846,407 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 2,981,863. The stock has a market capitalization of $188.39 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.23, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.32. The business's fifty day moving average is $311.16 and its two-hundred day moving average is $345.90. Accenture plc has a twelve month low of $275.01 and a twelve month high of $398.35. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.47.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN - Get Free Report) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $2.81 by $0.01. The firm had revenue of $16.70 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $16.64 billion. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The firm's revenue for the quarter was up 5.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $2.77 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, April 10th will be paid a dividend of $1.48 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 10th. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.97%. Accenture's dividend payout ratio is currently 48.89%.

Insider Transactions at Accenture

In other Accenture news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of the firm's stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $394.47, for a total value of $3,468,574.71. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 11,858 shares of the company's stock, valued at $4,677,625.26. This trade represents a 42.58 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 169 shares of the company's stock in a transaction dated Friday, April 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $281.90, for a total value of $47,641.10. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 5,364 shares of the company's stock, valued at $1,512,111.60. The trade was a 3.05 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 15,041 shares of company stock valued at $5,254,956 over the last 90 days. Corporate insiders own 0.02% of the company's stock.

Accenture Profile

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.