Principle Wealth Partners LLC Cuts Stake in Accenture PLC $ACN

Key Points

• Principle Wealth Partners LLC has significantly reduced its stake in Accenture PLC by 73.6%, now holding only 2,929 shares worth approximately $875,000.
• Accenture recently declared a quarterly dividend of $1.63 per share, marking an increase from the previous quarterly dividend of $1.48.
• The company's earnings report exceeded expectations, with a reported EPS of $3.03, surpassing analysts' estimates of $2.98, along with revenue growth of 7.3% year-over-year.

Principle Wealth Partners LLC lowered its position in shares of Accenture PLC (NYSE:ACN - Free Report) by 73.6% during the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 2,929 shares of the information technology services provider's stock after selling 8,160 shares during the period. Principle Wealth Partners LLC's holdings in Accenture were worth $875,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Truist Financial Corp increased its stake in shares of Accenture by 7.0% during the second quarter. Truist Financial Corp now owns 436,202 shares of the information technology services provider's stock valued at $130,376,000 after buying an additional 28,685 shares during the period. Redwood Investments LLC grew its stake in Accenture by 6.2% in the first quarter. Redwood Investments LLC now owns 22,087 shares of the information technology services provider's stock valued at $6,892,000 after purchasing an additional 1,287 shares during the last quarter. Lipe & Dalton grew its stake in Accenture by 2,087.4% in the first quarter. Lipe & Dalton now owns 5,031 shares of the information technology services provider's stock valued at $1,570,000 after purchasing an additional 4,801 shares during the last quarter. PDS Planning Inc grew its stake in Accenture by 34.7% in the second quarter. PDS Planning Inc now owns 4,055 shares of the information technology services provider's stock valued at $1,212,000 after purchasing an additional 1,044 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. grew its stake in Accenture by 6.4% in the second quarter. Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. now owns 70,887 shares of the information technology services provider's stock valued at $21,187,000 after purchasing an additional 4,281 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company's stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 9,000 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, October 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $249.57, for a total transaction of $2,246,130.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 23,516 shares of the company's stock, valued at $5,868,888.12. The trade was a 27.68% 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 Manish Sharma sold 6,902 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, October 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $250.01, for a total value of $1,725,569.02. Following the sale, the insider directly owned 1,860 shares of the company's stock, valued at $465,018.60. This trade represents a 78.77% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 18,402 shares of company stock valued at $4,595,374 over the last quarter. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts have issued reports on the company. Royal Bank Of Canada cut their target price on Accenture from $372.00 to $285.00 and set an "outperform" rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, September 26th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft cut their target price on Accenture from $260.00 to $235.00 and set a "hold" rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, September 26th. Cowen reiterated a "buy" rating on shares of Accenture in a research note on Friday, September 26th. Citigroup raised Accenture to a "hold" rating in a report on Thursday. Finally, Wall Street Zen downgraded Accenture from a "buy" rating to a "hold" rating in a report on Saturday, October 11th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, fourteen have issued a Buy rating, twelve have issued a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company's stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Accenture has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $297.48.

Accenture Price Performance

Shares of NYSE ACN opened at $249.59 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16, a quick ratio of 1.42 and a current ratio of 1.42. Accenture PLC has a fifty-two week low of $229.40 and a fifty-two week high of $398.35. The company has a market cap of $164.35 billion, a PE ratio of 20.54, a P/E/G ratio of 2.17 and a beta of 1.28. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of $247.25 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $277.81.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN - Get Free Report) last released its earnings results on Thursday, September 25th. The information technology services provider reported $3.03 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $2.98 by $0.05. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.45% and a net margin of 11.02%.The firm had revenue of $17.60 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $17.34 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $2.66 earnings per share. The company's revenue was up 7.3% compared to the same quarter last year. Accenture has set its FY 2026 guidance at 13.190-13.570 EPS. Q1 2026 guidance at EPS. As a group, equities analysts expect that Accenture PLC will post 12.73 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, November 14th. Investors of record on Friday, October 10th will be issued a dividend of $1.63 per share. This represents a $6.52 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.6%. This is a positive change from Accenture's previous quarterly dividend of $1.48. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, October 10th. Accenture's dividend payout ratio is presently 53.66%.

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.

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