Brown Advisory Inc. Boosts Holdings in Accenture PLC $ACN

Brown Advisory Inc. grew its stake in shares of Accenture PLC (NYSE:ACN) by 1.3% in the second quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund owned 321,428 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after buying an additional 4,203 shares during the quarter. Brown Advisory Inc.’s holdings in Accenture were worth $96,072,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other hedge funds have also modified their holdings of ACN. Brighton Jones LLC boosted its holdings in Accenture by 36.2% in the fourth quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 18,438 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $6,486,000 after acquiring an additional 4,905 shares during the last quarter. Chicago Partners Investment Group LLC raised its holdings in shares of Accenture by 8.2% in the 1st quarter. Chicago Partners Investment Group LLC now owns 15,040 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $4,604,000 after purchasing an additional 1,146 shares during the period. AlphaCore Capital LLC lifted its stake in shares of Accenture by 170.0% in the 1st quarter. AlphaCore Capital LLC now owns 9,316 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $2,907,000 after purchasing an additional 5,866 shares in the last quarter. Caisse Des Depots ET Consignations grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 0.9% during the 1st quarter. Caisse Des Depots ET Consignations now owns 122,238 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $38,143,000 after purchasing an additional 1,107 shares during the period. Finally, National Bank of Canada FI grew its holdings in shares of Accenture by 2.9% during the 1st quarter. National Bank of Canada FI now owns 152,337 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $47,568,000 after purchasing an additional 4,255 shares during the period. 75.14% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Accenture news, CEO Ryoji Sekido sold 2,500 shares of Accenture stock in a transaction on Wednesday, October 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $249.47, for a total value of $623,675.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 1,390 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $346,763.30. The trade was a 64.27% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, insider Manish Sharma sold 6,902 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, October 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $250.01, for a total transaction of $1,725,569.02. Following the sale, the insider owned 1,860 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $465,018.60. The trade was a 78.77% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders have sold a total of 33,319 shares of company stock valued at $8,335,225 in the last quarter. Insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Stock Down 1.1%

ACN stock opened at $266.33 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 1.42, a quick ratio of 1.42 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $248.00 and a 200-day simple moving average of $267.10. The company has a market capitalization of $175.37 billion, a P/E ratio of 21.92, a PEG ratio of 2.55 and a beta of 1.26. Accenture PLC has a twelve month low of $229.40 and a twelve month high of $398.35.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, September 25th. The information technology services provider reported $3.03 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.98 by $0.05. The company had revenue of $17.60 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.34 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.02% and a return on equity of 26.45%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 7.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the business earned $2.66 EPS. Accenture has set its FY 2026 guidance at 13.190-13.570 EPS. On average, equities research analysts predict that Accenture PLC will post 12.73 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Accenture Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 14th. Shareholders of record on Friday, October 10th were paid a dividend of $1.63 per share. The ex-dividend date was Friday, October 10th. This is an increase from Accenture’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.48. This represents a $6.52 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.4%. Accenture’s payout ratio is currently 53.66%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research analysts have weighed in on the stock. HSBC reduced their price target on shares of Accenture from $240.00 to $215.00 in a research report on Friday, September 26th. Morgan Stanley cut their target price on shares of Accenture from $325.00 to $271.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, September 9th. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “hold (c-)” rating on shares of Accenture in a research report on Wednesday, October 8th. Rothschild & Co Redburn raised their price objective on Accenture from $250.00 to $255.00 in a research report on Friday, September 19th. Finally, Cowen restated a “buy” rating on shares of Accenture in a research note on Friday, September 26th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, fifteen have assigned a Buy rating, eleven have given a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $294.25.

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.