MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. Makes New $30,000 Investment in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) during the third quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm purchased 85 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $30,000.

Other hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of the company. Zevin Asset Management LLC lifted its holdings in Accenture by 2.6% during the third quarter. Zevin Asset Management LLC now owns 33,532 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $11,853,000 after acquiring an additional 857 shares during the period. Strengthening Families & Communities LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Accenture by 7.0% in the 3rd quarter. Strengthening Families & Communities LLC now owns 7,800 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $2,757,000 after buying an additional 512 shares during the last quarter. TrinityPoint Wealth LLC grew its position in Accenture by 3.1% during the third quarter. TrinityPoint Wealth LLC now owns 4,140 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $1,463,000 after buying an additional 125 shares during the period. Claro Advisors LLC increased its holdings in Accenture by 6.7% during the third quarter. Claro Advisors LLC now owns 11,508 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $4,068,000 after buying an additional 727 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Adero Partners LLC raised its position in Accenture by 24.8% in the third quarter. Adero Partners LLC now owns 1,216 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $430,000 after acquiring an additional 242 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Trading Down 0.2 %

NYSE ACN opened at $352.79 on Tuesday. The stock has a 50-day moving average of $355.77 and a 200-day moving average of $327.83. Accenture plc has a 1-year low of $278.69 and a 1-year high of $387.51. The firm has a market cap of $220.55 billion, a PE ratio of 30.87, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.09 and a beta of 1.25.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, September 26th. The information technology services provider reported $2.79 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.78 by $0.01. Accenture had a net margin of 11.20% and a return on equity of 26.83%. The firm had revenue of $16.41 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $16.37 billion. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $2.71 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 2.6% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.77 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 15th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, October 10th were paid a dividend of $1.48 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, October 10th. This is a boost from Accenture’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.29. This represents a $5.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.68%. Accenture’s payout ratio is 51.79%.

Accenture announced that its board has authorized a share buyback program on Thursday, September 26th that allows the company to repurchase $4.00 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization allows the information technology services provider to repurchase up to 1.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are generally a sign that the company’s board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

ACN has been the subject of several research analyst reports. Susquehanna raised their price target on shares of Accenture from $350.00 to $360.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, September 27th. Piper Sandler Companies reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and set a $329.00 price target on shares of Accenture in a research report on Friday, September 20th. Bank of America lifted their price objective on Accenture from $365.00 to $388.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. UBS Group upped their price objective on shares of Accenture from $400.00 to $415.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. Finally, Barclays lifted their target price on shares of Accenture from $350.00 to $415.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, September 30th. Ten research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $368.23.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 9,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, October 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $376.16, for a total value of $3,385,440.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 20,324 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $7,645,075.84. This represents a 30.69 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 673 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, October 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $372.18, for a total value of $250,477.14. Following the sale, the insider now owns 5,650 shares in the company, valued at $2,102,817. This represents a 10.64 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 36,298 shares of company stock valued at $13,372,661 over the last quarter. 0.07% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

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.