Accenture PLC $ACN Shares Sold by Panagora Asset Management Inc.

Panagora Asset Management Inc. lessened its stake in Accenture PLC (NYSE:ACN) by 75.5% during the second quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 6,286 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 19,373 shares during the quarter. Panagora Asset Management Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $1,879,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in ACN. Sanders Capital LLC purchased a new stake in Accenture during the second quarter valued at about $2,637,640,000. Norges Bank acquired a new position in shares of Accenture in the 2nd quarter valued at about $2,216,850,000. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 63.9% during the 1st quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 8,953,621 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $2,793,889,000 after purchasing an additional 3,490,569 shares during the period. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its holdings in Accenture by 2.1% in the second quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 65,129,782 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $19,466,641,000 after buying an additional 1,315,548 shares during the period. Finally, McElhenny Sheffield Capital Management LLC acquired a new position in Accenture during the second quarter valued at approximately $308,000. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insider Activity

In other Accenture news, insider Manish Sharma sold 6,902 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, October 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $250.01, for a total transaction of $1,725,569.02. Following the sale, the insider owned 1,860 shares in the company, valued at $465,018.60. This represents a 78.77% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 2,500 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, October 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $249.47, for a total value of $623,675.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 1,390 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $346,763.30. The trade was a 64.27% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. In the last 90 days, insiders have sold 33,319 shares of company stock worth $8,335,225. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts have recently issued reports on ACN shares. Rothschild Redb lowered shares of Accenture from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, September 3rd. Citigroup upgraded Accenture to a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, October 23rd. The Goldman Sachs Group cut their price objective on Accenture from $370.00 to $330.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, September 26th. TD Cowen decreased their target price on Accenture from $313.00 to $295.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, September 26th. Finally, Rothschild & Co Redburn raised their target price on Accenture from $250.00 to $255.00 in a report on Friday, September 19th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, fifteen have given a Buy rating, eleven have issued a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $294.25.

Accenture Trading Down 1.3%

NYSE:ACN opened at $269.31 on Friday. The stock has a market cap of $177.33 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.17, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.59 and a beta of 1.26. Accenture PLC has a one year low of $229.40 and a one year high of $398.35. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16, a quick ratio of 1.42 and a current ratio of 1.42. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $247.47 and its 200 day simple moving average is $267.46.

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

Accenture Increases Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 14th. Shareholders of record on Friday, October 10th were issued a dividend of $1.63 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, October 10th. This represents a $6.52 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.4%. This is an increase from Accenture’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.48. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 53.66%.

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.