Is it a Good Move to Buy Accenture (ACN) Shares?

Baron Funds, an asset management firm, published its “Baron Durable Advantage Fund” first quarter 2022 investor letter – a copy of which can be downloaded here. Baron Durable Advantage Fund (the "Fund") declined 10.3% (Institutional Shares) during the first quarter, compared to the 4.6% decline for the S&P 500 Index (the "Index"), the Fund's benchmark. Try to spend some time looking at the fund’s top 5 holdings to be informed about their best picks for 2022.

In its Q1 2022 investor letter, Baron Durable Advantage Fund mentioned Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) and explained its insights for the company. Founded in 1989, Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) is a Dublin, Ireland-based multinational professional services company with a $181.4 billion market capitalization. Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) delivered a -30.97% return since the beginning of the year, while its 12-month returns are down by -0.29%. The stock closed at $286.17 per share on May 16, 2022.

Here is what Baron Durable Advantage Fund has to say about Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) in its Q1 2022 investor letter:

"Another good example is the leading consulting company, Accenture, plc (NYSE:ACN), whose stock was down 18% during the quarter despite the company reporting sparkling results with mid-20s year-over-year growth rates in revenues, EBIT, and EPS, driven by double-digit growth across all markets, industries, and services while continuing to gain market share (growing at nearly 3 times the market rate). In addition to expected strength in smaller deals, Accenture had 36 clients booking over $100 million worth of business in the last quarter alone. While most investors remain concerned about a pull-forward of demand, the company is not seeing a slowdown as digital transformations became a must for organizations to remain competitive as described by the company in its latest earnings conference call:

Roman Samborskyi/Shutterstock.com

Our calculations show that Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) fell short and didn’t make it on our list of the 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) was in 50 hedge fund portfolios at the end of the fourth quarter of 2021, compared to 56 funds in the previous quarter. Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) delivered a -12.25% return in the past 3 months.

In April 2022, we also shared another hedge fund’s views on Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) in another article. You can find other investor letters from hedge funds and prominent investors on our hedge fund investor letters 2022 Q1 page.

Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.