American National Bank Sells 2,506 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

American National Bank cut its stake in shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 6.7% during the 2nd quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 34,963 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 2,506 shares during the period. Accenture comprises 1.8% of American National Bank’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 13th largest position. American National Bank’s holdings in Accenture were worth $10,789,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Strategic Investment Solutions Inc. IL acquired a new stake in Accenture during the 1st quarter worth approximately $28,000. Barrett & Company Inc. acquired a new stake in Accenture during the 1st quarter worth approximately $29,000. Sageworth Trust Co boosted its position in Accenture by 872.7% during the 1st quarter. Sageworth Trust Co now owns 107 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $31,000 after buying an additional 96 shares during the period. Guardian Wealth Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in Accenture during the 1st quarter worth approximately $32,000. Finally, First Command Financial Services Inc. boosted its position in Accenture by 131.6% during the 1st quarter. First Command Financial Services Inc. now owns 132 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $38,000 after buying an additional 75 shares during the period. 70.42% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Accenture news, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 1,344 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, June 26th. The shares were sold at an average price of $300.00, for a total transaction of $403,200.00. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 10,506 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,151,800. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. In other news, General Counsel Joel Unruch sold 7,000 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Thursday, July 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $320.60, for a total value of $2,244,200.00. Following the sale, the general counsel now directly owns 36,034 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $11,552,500.40. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, CAO Melissa A. Burgum sold 1,344 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, June 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $300.00, for a total transaction of $403,200.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 10,506 shares in the company, valued at $3,151,800. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last ninety days, insiders have sold 25,774 shares of company stock valued at $8,138,451. 0.08% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages have recently issued reports on ACN. BMO Capital Markets downgraded shares of Accenture from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 3rd. Piper Sandler upgraded shares of Accenture from an “underweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and boosted their price target for the stock from $250.00 to $316.00 in a research report on Wednesday, June 14th. Citigroup restated a “buy” rating and issued a $358.00 price target on shares of Accenture in a research report on Monday. Stifel Nicolaus boosted their target price on shares of Accenture from $310.00 to $343.00 in a research report on Thursday, June 15th. Finally, Piper Jaffray Companies dropped their target price on shares of Accenture from $316.00 to $314.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, June 23rd. Six analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eleven have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $335.25.

Accenture Price Performance

NYSE ACN opened at $315.91 on Tuesday. The company has a fifty day moving average price of $316.31 and a 200-day moving average price of $296.37. The firm has a market cap of $209.97 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 28.16, a PEG ratio of 2.67 and a beta of 1.22. Accenture plc has a 1 year low of $242.80 and a 1 year high of $330.43.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, June 22nd. The information technology services provider reported $3.19 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.96 by $0.23. The company had revenue of $16.56 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $16.49 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.28% and a return on equity of 30.47%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 2.5% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $2.79 EPS. On average, research analysts anticipate that Accenture plc will post 11.6 EPS for the current fiscal year.

About Accenture

Accenture plc, a professional services company, provides strategy and consulting, interactive, 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 comprises 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 comprises turnkey analytics and artificial intelligence (AI) solutions; metaverse; and sustainability services.