Hillsdale Investment Management Inc. Buys 1,050 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Hillsdale Investment Management Inc. increased its stake in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 99.5% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 2,105 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 1,050 shares during the quarter. Hillsdale Investment Management Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $741,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of the stock. State Street Corp grew its stake in Accenture by 1.8% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 27,400,836 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $9,685,648,000 after buying an additional 471,792 shares in the last quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC grew its stake in Accenture by 378.9% in the 3rd quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 5,491,736 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,941,219,000 after buying an additional 4,345,039 shares in the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. grew its stake in Accenture by 2.9% in the 4th quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 4,964,480 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,746,455,000 after buying an additional 140,726 shares in the last quarter. Amundi grew its stake in Accenture by 27.9% in the 4th quarter. Amundi now owns 3,790,069 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,353,909,000 after buying an additional 826,038 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Swedbank AB grew its stake in Accenture by 47.5% in the 4th quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 3,763,690 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,324,029,000 after buying an additional 1,212,011 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of research analysts recently weighed in on ACN shares. Stifel Nicolaus reduced their price objective on shares of Accenture from $390.00 to $380.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, February 26th. UBS Group reduced their price objective on shares of Accenture from $455.00 to $387.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Friday. Guggenheim reduced their price target on shares of Accenture from $400.00 to $395.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Friday. Wolfe Research upgraded shares of Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 price target for the company in a research report on Wednesday, January 8th. Finally, StockNews.com lowered shares of Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Tuesday, March 11th. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Accenture has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $380.05.

Accenture Stock Performance

Accenture stock opened at $305.17 on Monday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.47, a current ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17. The company has a market capitalization of $190.97 billion, a PE ratio of 25.60, a P/E/G ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The firm has a fifty day simple moving average of $359.16 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $357.33. Accenture plc has a twelve month low of $278.69 and a twelve month high of $398.35.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, March 20th. The information technology services provider reported $2.82 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.81 by $0.01. The business had revenue of $16.70 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $16.64 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 5.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $2.77 earnings per share. Research analysts expect that Accenture plc will post 12.73 EPS for the current year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, April 10th will be paid a $1.48 dividend. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.94%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 10th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is presently 49.66%.

Insider Activity

In other news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 2,497 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $354.48, for a total transaction of $885,136.56. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 28,866 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $10,232,419.68. This represents a 7.96 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 1,487 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, January 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $354.54, for a total transaction of $527,200.98. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 9,247 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,278,431.38. This trade represents a 13.85 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders sold 21,905 shares of company stock valued at $8,181,753. Insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

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.