BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp Increases Stake in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp increased its position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN - Free Report) by 11.0% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 152,261 shares of the information technology services provider's stock after acquiring an additional 15,133 shares during the quarter. BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp's holdings in Accenture were worth $53,564,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of ACN. Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of Accenture in the fourth quarter worth $2,351,683,000. Wellington Management Group LLP increased its stake in Accenture by 22.8% in the 4th 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 during the last quarter. Raymond James Financial Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Accenture in the 4th quarter valued at about $666,495,000. Capital Research Global Investors grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 16.8% during the fourth quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 12,295,748 shares of the information technology services provider's stock worth $4,325,526,000 after purchasing an additional 1,770,024 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Swedbank AB increased its position in shares of Accenture by 47.5% in the fourth quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 3,763,690 shares of the information technology services provider's stock worth $1,324,029,000 after purchasing an additional 1,212,011 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company's stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

ACN has been the subject of a number of research reports. Robert W. Baird raised shares of Accenture from a "neutral" rating to an "outperform" rating and set a $390.00 price target for the company in a research note on Monday, March 17th. Baird R W raised Accenture from a "hold" rating to a "strong-buy" rating in a research note on Monday, March 17th. Royal Bank of Canada dropped their price target on Accenture from $399.00 to $392.00 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a research note on Friday, March 21st. Morgan Stanley cut their target price on Accenture from $380.00 to $372.00 and set an "equal weight" rating for the company in a research note on Monday, March 17th. Finally, Guggenheim lowered their price objective on shares of Accenture from $400.00 to $395.00 and set a "buy" rating for the company in a report on Friday, March 21st. Seven 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 data from MarketBeat, Accenture currently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average target price of $382.14.

Accenture Trading Down 2.2%

NYSE ACN traded down $6.94 on Monday, hitting $309.51. The company's stock had a trading volume of 2,946,692 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,999,301. The company has a current ratio of 1.47, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17. Accenture plc has a 52-week low of $275.01 and a 52-week high of $398.35. The firm has a market cap of $193.86 billion, a P/E ratio of 25.97, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.35. The company's 50-day simple moving average is $302.06 and its 200 day simple moving average is $339.97.

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

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, April 10th were given a dividend of $1.48 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, April 10th. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.91%. Accenture's payout ratio is 48.89%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, General Counsel Joel Unruch sold 3,563 shares of the business's stock in a transaction on Friday, April 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $281.78, for a total transaction of $1,003,982.14. Following the sale, the general counsel now owns 17,237 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,857,041.86. The trade was a 17.13% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, COO John F. Walsh sold 2,500 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, May 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $325.00, for a total transaction of $812,500.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief operating officer now owns 15,882 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $5,161,650. The trade was a 13.60% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders have sold 8,516 shares of company stock worth $2,507,366. Company insiders own 0.02% of the company's stock.

Accenture Company 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.