Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) Price Target Cut to $295.00 by Analysts at Robert W. Baird

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) had its price target decreased by Robert W. Baird from $310.00 to $295.00 in a report issued on Friday,Benzinga reports. Robert W. Baird currently has a neutral rating on the electronics maker’s stock.

Several other analysts have also commented on the company. William Blair raised Acuity Brands from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, January 2nd. Wells Fargo & Company dropped their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $336.00 to $290.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, March 28th. Oppenheimer boosted their target price on shares of Acuity Brands from $370.00 to $380.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 9th. StockNews.com lowered shares of Acuity Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Saturday, March 1st. Finally, Morgan Stanley upgraded shares of Acuity Brands from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and upped their price objective for the stock from $304.00 to $370.00 in a research report on Tuesday, January 14th. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Acuity Brands presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $324.60.

Acuity Brands Stock Down 9.4 %

AYI stock opened at $233.15 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $7.22 billion, a P/E ratio of 17.17, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.95 and a beta of 1.43. Acuity Brands has a 12 month low of $217.64 and a 12 month high of $345.30. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $294.09 and its 200-day simple moving average is $304.28. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20, a current ratio of 2.98 and a quick ratio of 2.38.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, April 3rd. The electronics maker reported $3.73 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.67 by $0.06. The company had revenue of $1.01 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.03 billion. Acuity Brands had a net margin of 11.11% and a return on equity of 19.98%. The firm’s revenue was up 11.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $3.38 earnings per share. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Acuity Brands will post 15.86 earnings per share for the current year.

Acuity Brands Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 1st. Investors of record on Friday, April 18th will be issued a $0.17 dividend. This represents a $0.68 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.29%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, April 17th. Acuity Brands’s payout ratio is presently 5.16%.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Acuity Brands

A number of large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in AYI. Oddo BHF Asset Management Sas purchased a new stake in shares of Acuity Brands during the third quarter worth about $3,849,000. Merit Financial Group LLC acquired a new stake in Acuity Brands in the 4th quarter worth about $232,000. Orion Portfolio Solutions LLC increased its stake in Acuity Brands by 213.4% during the 3rd quarter. Orion Portfolio Solutions LLC now owns 5,040 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $1,388,000 after buying an additional 3,432 shares in the last quarter. Smith Group Asset Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Acuity Brands during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $19,703,000. Finally, Stifel Financial Corp lifted its position in shares of Acuity Brands by 12.3% in the third quarter. Stifel Financial Corp now owns 7,642 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $2,105,000 after acquiring an additional 835 shares in the last quarter. 98.21% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Acuity Brands Company Profile

Acuity Brands, Inc provides lighting, lighting controls, building management system, location-aware applications in the United States and internationally. The company operates in two segments, Acuity Brands Lighting and Lighting Controls (ABL); and the Intelligent Spaces Group (ISG). The ABL segment provides commercial, architectural, and specialty lighting solutions, as well as lighting controls and components for various indoor and outdoor applications under the A-Light, Aculux, American Electric Lighting, Cyclone, Dark to Light, eldoLED, Eureka, Gotham, Healthcare Lighting, Holophane, Hydrel, Indy, IOTA, Juno, Lithonia Lighting, Luminaire LED, Luminis, Mark Architectural Lighting, nLight, OPTOTRONIC, Peerless, RELOCWiring Solutions, and Sensor Switch.