Global professional services company Accenture (NYSE: ACN) reported revenue ahead of Wall Streets expectations in Q4 CY2025, with sales up 6% year on year to $18.74 billion. The company expects next quarter’s revenue to be around $17.68 billion, close to analysts’ estimates. Its non-GAAP profit of $3.94 per share was 5.9% above analysts’ consensus estimates.

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Company Overview

With a workforce of approximately 774,000 people serving clients in more than 120 countries, Accenture (NYSE: ACN) is a professional services firm that helps organizations transform their businesses through consulting, technology, operations, and digital services.

Revenue Growth

A company’s long-term sales performance can indicate its overall quality. Even a bad business can shine for one or two quarters, but a top-tier one grows for years.

With $70.73 billion in revenue over the past 12 months, Accenture is a behemoth in the business services sector and benefits from economies of scale, giving it an edge in distribution. This also enables it to gain more leverage on its fixed costs than smaller competitors and the flexibility to offer lower prices.

As you can see below, Accenture’s sales grew at an impressive 9.6% compounded annual growth rate over the last five years. This is an encouraging starting point for our analysis because it shows Accenture’s demand was higher than many business services companies.

Long-term growth is the most important, but within business services, a half-decade historical view may miss new innovations or demand cycles. Accenture’s recent performance shows its demand has slowed significantly as its annualized revenue growth of 4.6% over the last two years was well below its five-year trend.

This quarter, Accenture reported year-on-year revenue growth of 6%, and its $18.74 billion of revenue exceeded Wall Street’s estimates by 1.2%. Company management is currently guiding for a 6.1% year-on-year increase in sales next quarter.

Looking further ahead, sell-side analysts expect revenue to grow 5.4% over the next 12 months, similar to its two-year rate. This projection is above the sector average and indicates its newer products and services will help maintain its recent top-line performance.

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Operating Margin

Accenture’s operating margin might fluctuated slightly over the last 12 months but has remained more or less the same, averaging 14.7% over the last five years. This profitability was top-notch for a business services business, showing it’s an well-run company with an efficient cost structure.

Looking at the trend in its profitability, Accenture’s operating margin might fluctuated slightly but has generally stayed the same over the last five years. This raises questions about the company’s expense base because its revenue growth should have given it leverage on its fixed costs, resulting in better economies of scale and profitability.

In Q4, Accenture generated an operating margin profit margin of 15.3%, down 1.3 percentage points year on year. This reduction is quite minuscule and indicates the company’s overall cost structure has been relatively stable.

Earnings Per Share

Revenue trends explain a company’s historical growth, but the long-term change in earnings per share (EPS) points to the profitability of that growth – for example, a company could inflate its sales through excessive spending on advertising and promotions.

Accenture’s remarkable 11.6% annual EPS growth over the last five years aligns with its revenue performance. This tells us it maintained its per-share profitability as it expanded.

Like with revenue, we analyze EPS over a more recent period because it can provide insight into an emerging theme or development for the business.

Although it wasn’t great, Accenture’s two-year annual EPS growth of 7.4% topped its 4.6% two-year revenue growth.

Diving into the nuances of Accenture’s earnings can give us a better understanding of its performance. A two-year view shows that Accenture has repurchased its stock, shrinking its share count by 1.8%. This tells us its EPS outperformed its revenue not because of increased operational efficiency but financial engineering, as buybacks boost per share earnings.

In Q4, Accenture reported adjusted EPS of $3.94, up from $3.59 in the same quarter last year. This print beat analysts’ estimates by 5.9%. Over the next 12 months, Wall Street expects Accenture’s full-year EPS of $13.28 to grow 5.8%.

Key Takeaways from Accenture’s Q4 Results

It was good to see Accenture beat analysts’ EPS expectations this quarter. We were also happy its revenue narrowly outperformed Wall Street’s estimates. On the other hand, its full-year EPS guidance was in line and its revenue guidance for next quarter was in line with Wall Street’s estimates. Zooming out, we think this was a mixed quarter. The stock traded up 1.5% to $277.98 immediately following the results.

Is Accenture an attractive investment opportunity right now? We think that the latest quarter is only one piece of the longer-term business quality puzzle. Quality, when combined with valuation, can help determine if the stock is a buy. We cover that in our actionable full research report which you can read here, it’s free for active Edge members.