Raymond James Financial Inc. Takes Position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Raymond James Financial Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm acquired 1,894,581 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $666,495,000. Raymond James Financial Inc. owned approximately 0.30% of Accenture as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of ACN. Promus Capital LLC acquired a new stake in Accenture in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $34,000. Cullen Frost Bankers Inc. boosted its stake in Accenture by 12.6% in the fourth quarter. Cullen Frost Bankers Inc. now owns 10,367 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $3,647,000 after acquiring an additional 1,163 shares in the last quarter. Arizona State Retirement System boosted its stake in Accenture by 0.9% in the fourth quarter. Arizona State Retirement System now owns 181,260 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $63,765,000 after acquiring an additional 1,661 shares in the last quarter. Aigen Investment Management LP acquired a new stake in Accenture in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $1,329,000. Finally, Proficio Capital Partners LLC boosted its stake in Accenture by 47.6% in the fourth quarter. Proficio Capital Partners LLC now owns 2,446 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $861,000 after acquiring an additional 789 shares in the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Accenture Stock Up 0.7 %

Shares of NYSE ACN opened at $348.27 on Thursday. The company’s 50-day simple moving average is $366.41 and its 200-day simple moving average is $358.30. Accenture plc has a 52-week low of $278.69 and a 52-week high of $398.35. The firm has a market cap of $217.94 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.22, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The company has a quick ratio of 1.47, a current ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The business had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $3.27 earnings per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 12.73 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total transaction of $134,437.50. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 5,149 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,845,916.50. The trade was a 6.79 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $394.47, for a total transaction of $3,468,574.71. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 11,858 shares in the company, valued at $4,677,625.26. This trade represents a 42.58 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 22,280 shares of company stock worth $8,316,190. 0.02% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages have weighed in on ACN. The Goldman Sachs Group upgraded shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and raised their target price for the company from $370.00 to $420.00 in a research note on Friday, December 6th. Wolfe Research raised shares of Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price target for the company in a report on Wednesday, January 8th. StockNews.com raised shares of Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, January 13th. Stifel Nicolaus decreased their price target on shares of Accenture from $390.00 to $380.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, February 26th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group decreased their price target on shares of Accenture from $385.00 to $355.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, January 21st. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $388.96.

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.