Accenture (NYSE:ACN) Downgraded to “Hold” Rating by StockNews.com

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) was downgraded by StockNews.com from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note issued to investors on Sunday.

A number of other brokerages have also recently weighed in on ACN. BNP Paribas cut Accenture from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $375.00 price target for the company. in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Royal Bank of Canada upped their target price on Accenture from $377.00 to $389.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. Citigroup lifted their price target on shares of Accenture from $350.00 to $405.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, September 17th. Piper Sandler raised their target price on shares of Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. Finally, Susquehanna boosted their target price on shares of Accenture from $350.00 to $360.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. Nine analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fourteen have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $383.23.

Accenture Price Performance

ACN opened at $351.26 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $219.81 billion, a PE ratio of 30.73, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The business has a 50-day moving average of $357.39 and a 200-day moving average of $342.94. Accenture has a fifty-two week low of $278.69 and a fifty-two week high of $387.51.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. The company had revenue of $17.69 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $17.15 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.20% and a return on equity of 26.83%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $3.27 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts expect that Accenture will post 12.74 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture declared that its board has initiated a stock buyback program on Thursday, September 26th that allows the company to repurchase $4.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization allows the information technology services provider to buy up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are typically a sign that the company’s leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Accenture news, COO John F. Walsh sold 5,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $373.24, for a total transaction of $1,866,200.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief operating officer now directly owns 17,593 shares in the company, valued at $6,566,411.32. This represents a 22.13 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 9,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, October 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $376.16, for a total transaction of $3,385,440.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 20,324 shares in the company, valued at approximately $7,645,075.84. The trade was a 30.69 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 36,673 shares of company stock worth $13,507,099 over the last quarter. Company insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of the business. Morse Asset Management Inc bought a new stake in Accenture during the 3rd quarter worth about $25,000. Strategic Financial Concepts LLC bought a new stake in shares of Accenture during the second quarter valued at approximately $28,000. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Accenture in the third quarter valued at approximately $30,000. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC lifted its holdings in Accenture by 607.1% during the 3rd quarter. Mowery & Schoenfeld Wealth Management LLC now owns 99 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $35,000 after buying an additional 85 shares in the last quarter. Finally, RPg Family Wealth Advisory LLC bought a new position in Accenture in the 3rd quarter valued at $39,000. 75.14% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

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.