Accenture (NYSE:ACN) Issues Earnings Results, Beats Estimates By $0.16 EPS

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) issued its earnings results on Thursday. 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, RTT News reports. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.83% and a net margin of 11.20%. The company had revenue of $17.69 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $17.15 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $3.27 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 9.0% on a year-over-year basis.

Accenture Stock Performance

ACN stock opened at $347.61 on Thursday. Accenture has a fifty-two week low of $278.69 and a fifty-two week high of $387.51. The company’s 50 day moving average price is $360.14 and its 200 day moving average price is $336.31. The firm has a market capitalization of $217.31 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.41, a PEG ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, January 16th will be given a $1.48 dividend. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.70%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is currently 51.79%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts recently issued reports on the stock. The Goldman Sachs Group raised shares of Accenture from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their price objective for the company from $370.00 to $420.00 in a report on Friday, December 6th. Guggenheim raised their price target on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $395.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. Susquehanna upped their price objective on Accenture from $350.00 to $360.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, September 27th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their target price on Accenture from $370.00 to $396.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday. Finally, Citigroup increased their price target on Accenture from $350.00 to $405.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, September 17th. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $374.50.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 8,136 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, October 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $362.07, for a total value of $2,945,801.52. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 12,188 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,412,909.16. This represents a 40.03 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 3,191 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $343.70, for a total transaction of $1,096,746.70. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 6 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,062.20. The trade was a 99.81 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 36,298 shares of company stock worth $13,372,661 in the last 90 days. Corporate insiders own 0.07% of the company’s stock.

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

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.