Thurston Springer Miller Herd & Titak Inc. Grows Stock Holdings in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Thurston Springer Miller Herd & Titak Inc. raised its stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 37.7% in the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 9,616 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after buying an additional 2,632 shares during the quarter. Accenture accounts for about 0.7% of Thurston Springer Miller Herd & Titak Inc.’s holdings, making the stock its 24th biggest position. Thurston Springer Miller Herd & Titak Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $3,383,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Other hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Park Avenue Securities LLC boosted its stake in Accenture by 28.5% in the 4th quarter. Park Avenue Securities LLC now owns 35,810 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $12,598,000 after purchasing an additional 7,952 shares in the last quarter. Kathmere Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in Accenture by 54.5% in the fourth quarter. Kathmere Capital Management LLC now owns 5,627 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,980,000 after buying an additional 1,984 shares during the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 2,666.5% during the fourth quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 715,219 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $251,607,000 after buying an additional 689,366 shares during the last quarter. Rockland Trust Co. increased its position in shares of Accenture by 3.2% during the fourth quarter. Rockland Trust Co. now owns 68,470 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $24,087,000 after acquiring an additional 2,107 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Fifth Third Wealth Advisors LLC raised its holdings in Accenture by 16.7% in the 4th quarter. Fifth Third Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 13,291 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $4,676,000 after acquiring an additional 1,899 shares during the last quarter. 75.14% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

ACN has been the subject of a number of research analyst reports. Mizuho lifted their target price on Accenture from $352.00 to $365.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, September 18th. StockNews.com raised Accenture from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday. UBS Group lifted their price target on shares of Accenture from $450.00 to $455.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, December 20th. Guggenheim increased their price objective on shares of Accenture from $380.00 to $395.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, September 27th. Finally, BMO Capital Markets boosted their target price on shares of Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research note on Friday, December 20th. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $385.04.

Insider Activity

In related news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 458 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $373.25, for a total value of $170,948.50. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 9,777 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,649,265.25. The trade was a 4.47 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Julie Spellman Sweet sold 9,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, October 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $376.16, for a total transaction of $3,385,440.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 20,324 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $7,645,075.84. This trade represents a 30.69 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 36,673 shares of company stock worth $13,507,099 over the last 90 days. Corporate insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Stock Performance

ACN opened at $348.34 on Wednesday. Accenture plc has a fifty-two week low of $278.69 and a fifty-two week high of $387.51. The stock has a market cap of $217.99 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.48, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.23 and a beta of 1.24. The firm’s fifty day moving average is $357.98 and its 200 day moving average is $344.94.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.43 by $0.16. Accenture had a return on equity of 26.83% and a net margin of 11.20%. The firm had revenue of $17.69 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.15 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $3.27 earnings per share. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities research analysts predict that Accenture plc will post 12.74 earnings per share for the current year.

Accenture Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Investors of record on Thursday, January 16th will be given a dividend of $1.48 per share. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, January 16th. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.70%. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is 49.66%.

Accenture announced that its board has authorized a stock buyback plan on Thursday, September 26th that authorizes the company to buyback $4.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the information technology services provider to reacquire up to 1.8% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are generally a sign that the company’s board believes its stock is undervalued.

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.