Picton Mahoney Asset Management Cuts Stock Holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Picton Mahoney Asset Management lowered its position in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 8.9% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 6,700 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 655 shares during the period. Picton Mahoney Asset Management’s holdings in Accenture were worth $2,351,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of ACN. Chilton Capital Management LLC grew its stake in shares of Accenture by 180.0% during the fourth quarter. Chilton Capital Management LLC now owns 70 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $25,000 after purchasing an additional 45 shares in the last quarter. DiNuzzo Private Wealth Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Accenture during the fourth quarter worth $27,000. BluePath Capital Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Accenture during the third quarter worth $31,000. Halpern Financial Inc. acquired a new position in Accenture in the fourth quarter valued at $31,000. Finally, Valued Wealth Advisors LLC acquired a new position in Accenture in the fourth quarter valued at $50,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Insider Transactions at Accenture

In other news, CEO Jean-Marc Ollagnier sold 6,250 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, April 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $315.91, for a total transaction of $1,974,437.50. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 161,581 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $51,045,053.71. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. In related news, COO John F. Walsh sold 8,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, March 25th. The shares were sold at an average price of $332.13, for a total transaction of $2,657,040.00. Following the sale, the chief operating officer now owns 17,877 shares in the company, valued at $5,937,488.01. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Jean-Marc Ollagnier sold 6,250 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, April 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $315.91, for a total transaction of $1,974,437.50. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 161,581 shares in the company, valued at approximately $51,045,053.71. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 28,083 shares of company stock valued at $8,959,325 in the last ninety days. Corporate insiders own 0.07% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research firms have issued reports on ACN. Piper Sandler upped their price objective on shares of Accenture from $335.00 to $394.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Monday, March 18th. Mizuho restated a “buy” rating and issued a $398.00 price objective (down previously from $426.00) on shares of Accenture in a research note on Friday, March 22nd. Stifel Nicolaus upped their price objective on shares of Accenture from $363.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, March 18th. TD Cowen decreased their target price on shares of Accenture from $363.00 to $350.00 and set a “market perform” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, March 22nd. Finally, StockNews.com downgraded shares of Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Saturday, April 27th. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $387.00.

Accenture Price Performance

Accenture stock traded up $1.33 during mid-day trading on Wednesday, reaching $311.99. The company had a trading volume of 2,283,894 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,499,014. Accenture plc has a 1 year low of $261.68 and a 1 year high of $387.51. The company has a market capitalization of $209.26 billion, a P/E ratio of 28.29, a P/E/G ratio of 2.88 and a beta of 1.21. The stock’s 50-day simple moving average is $340.17 and its 200-day simple moving average is $342.35.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, March 21st. The information technology services provider reported $2.77 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.66 by $0.11. Accenture had a net margin of 10.89% and a return on equity of 28.30%. The company had revenue of $15.80 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $15.85 billion. During the same period last year, the company posted $2.69 earnings per share. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down .1% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.09 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, May 15th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, April 11th will be paid a dividend of $1.29 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, April 10th. This represents a $5.16 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.65%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 46.78%.

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.