Cibc World Markets Corp Grows Position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Cibc World Markets Corp increased its position in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 16.0% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 98,568 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 13,564 shares during the quarter. Cibc World Markets Corp’s holdings in Accenture were worth $34,675,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other large investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. State Street Corp raised its stake in Accenture by 1.8% during the third 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 during the last quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC raised its stake in Accenture by 378.9% during the third 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 during the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. raised its stake in Accenture by 2.9% during the fourth 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 during the last quarter. Amundi raised its stake in Accenture by 27.9% during the fourth 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 during the last quarter. Finally, Swedbank AB raised its stake in Accenture by 47.5% during the fourth 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 during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research firms have commented on ACN. Wolfe Research raised Accenture from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $425.00 target price for the company in a report on Wednesday, January 8th. Stifel Nicolaus reduced their target price on Accenture from $390.00 to $380.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, February 26th. Morgan Stanley lifted their target price on Accenture from $335.00 to $380.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, January 31st. Piper Sandler reduced their target price on Accenture from $429.00 to $396.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Friday. Finally, StockNews.com lowered Accenture from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Tuesday, March 11th. Nine research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $387.52.

Accenture Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE ACN opened at $318.28 on Monday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.47. Accenture plc has a 1 year low of $278.69 and a 1 year high of $398.35. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $363.01 and a 200-day moving average price of $358.24. The stock has a market cap of $199.17 billion, a PE ratio of 26.70, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24.

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

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 232 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $394.46, for a total transaction of $91,514.72. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 8,915 shares in the company, valued at $3,516,610.90. This trade represents a 2.54 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,793 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $394.47, for a total transaction of $3,468,574.71. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 11,858 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,677,625.26. The trade was a 42.58 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 22,280 shares of company stock valued at $8,316,190. Corporate 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.