Bond & Devick Financial Network Inc. Trims Stake in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Bond & Devick Financial Network Inc. lowered its position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN - Free Report) by 11.9% in the first quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 20,293 shares of the information technology services provider's stock after selling 2,740 shares during the quarter. Accenture accounts for about 2.3% of Bond & Devick Financial Network Inc.'s holdings, making the stock its 12th largest position. Bond & Devick Financial Network Inc.'s holdings in Accenture were worth $6,332,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors also recently modified their holdings of the company. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. increased its stake in shares of Accenture by 62.2% in the fourth quarter. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. now owns 73 shares of the information technology services provider's stock valued at $28,000 after buying an additional 28 shares in the last quarter. Kohmann Bosshard Financial Services LLC acquired a new stake in Accenture in the fourth quarter worth about $30,000. Mpwm Advisory Solutions LLC acquired a new stake in Accenture in the fourth quarter worth about $30,000. POM Investment Strategies LLC grew its position in shares of Accenture by 64.2% during the 4th quarter. POM Investment Strategies LLC now owns 87 shares of the information technology services provider's stock worth $31,000 after buying an additional 34 shares during the period. Finally, Park Square Financial Group LLC acquired a new position in shares of Accenture during the 4th quarter worth about $31,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company's stock.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, insider Angela Beatty sold 169 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, April 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $281.90, for a total transaction of $47,641.10. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 5,364 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,512,111.60. This represents a 3.05% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 2,284 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, April 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $281.63, for a total value of $643,242.92. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 9,965 shares of the company's stock, valued at $2,806,442.95. This represents a 18.65% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 8,516 shares of company stock worth $2,507,366 in the last ninety days. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms have recently issued reports on ACN. UBS Group restated a "buy" rating and set a $395.00 target price (up from $390.00) on shares of Accenture in a research report on Thursday, May 22nd. Baird R W upgraded Accenture from a "hold" rating to a "strong-buy" rating in a research note on Monday, March 17th. Piper Sandler lowered their target price on shares of Accenture from $364.00 to $355.00 and set an "overweight" rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, April 16th. Stifel Nicolaus cut their price objective on Accenture from $390.00 to $380.00 and set a "buy" rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, February 26th. Finally, Guggenheim decreased their price objective on Accenture from $400.00 to $395.00 and set a "buy" rating on the stock in a report on Friday, March 21st. Seven 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 stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average target price of $382.14.

Accenture Stock Performance

Shares of ACN traded down $1.54 during mid-day trading on Tuesday, hitting $312.94. The stock had a trading volume of 3,678,232 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,970,416. The firm has a market cap of $196.00 billion, a P/E ratio of 26.25, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.35. Accenture plc has a 52 week low of $275.01 and a 52 week 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. The business has a fifty day moving average price of $302.69 and a 200-day moving average price of $338.08.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $2.81 by $0.01. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.91% and a net margin of 11.41%. The company had revenue of $16.70 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $16.64 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $2.77 EPS. The firm's revenue for the quarter was up 5.7% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities research analysts expect that Accenture plc will post 12.73 EPS for the current year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, May 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, April 10th were paid a dividend of $1.48 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, April 10th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.89%. Accenture's payout ratio is 48.89%.

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.