GSA Capital Partners LLP Lowers Stock Holdings in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI)

GSA Capital Partners LLP lowered its position in shares of Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) by 51.0% in the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 3,565 shares of the electronics maker’s stock after selling 3,711 shares during the period. GSA Capital Partners LLP’s holdings in Acuity Brands were worth $982,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also bought and sold shares of AYI. Russell Investments Group Ltd. grew its position in shares of Acuity Brands by 15.0% during the 1st quarter. Russell Investments Group Ltd. now owns 42,027 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $11,281,000 after purchasing an additional 5,474 shares in the last quarter. State Board of Administration of Florida Retirement System grew its position in Acuity Brands by 33.9% during the first quarter. State Board of Administration of Florida Retirement System now owns 38,071 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $10,231,000 after buying an additional 9,630 shares in the last quarter. Blair William & Co. IL increased its stake in Acuity Brands by 3.5% in the 1st quarter. Blair William & Co. IL now owns 1,435 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $386,000 after acquiring an additional 48 shares during the last quarter. Mitsubishi UFJ Trust & Banking Corp raised its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 148.4% in the 1st quarter. Mitsubishi UFJ Trust & Banking Corp now owns 4,397 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $1,166,000 after acquiring an additional 2,627 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Acadian Asset Management LLC boosted its position in shares of Acuity Brands by 11.4% during the 1st quarter. Acadian Asset Management LLC now owns 74,143 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $19,922,000 after acquiring an additional 7,601 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 98.21% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research firms recently weighed in on AYI. The Goldman Sachs Group upped their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $266.00 to $303.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 2nd. Oppenheimer increased their price target on shares of Acuity Brands from $315.00 to $370.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 2nd. Robert W. Baird lifted their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $280.00 to $318.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 2nd. Wells Fargo & Company increased their target price on Acuity Brands from $289.00 to $305.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 2nd. Finally, StockNews.com raised Acuity Brands from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 31st. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, one has issued a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $324.00.

Acuity Brands Price Performance

Shares of Acuity Brands stock opened at $325.87 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.21, a quick ratio of 2.16 and a current ratio of 2.72. Acuity Brands, Inc. has a 52-week low of $176.93 and a 52-week high of $337.99. The company has a fifty day moving average of $293.41 and a 200-day moving average of $264.34. The stock has a market capitalization of $10.06 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 24.25, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.13 and a beta of 1.40.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 1st. The electronics maker reported $4.30 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.90 by $0.40. Acuity Brands had a net margin of 11.00% and a return on equity of 20.49%. The business had revenue of $1.03 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.02 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $3.74 earnings per share. The company’s revenue was up 2.2% on a year-over-year basis. Equities research analysts expect that Acuity Brands, Inc. will post 15.55 EPS for the current year.

Acuity Brands Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 1st. Investors of record on Friday, October 18th were given a dividend of $0.15 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, October 18th. This represents a $0.60 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.18%. Acuity Brands’s payout ratio is 4.46%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, SVP Barry R. Goldman sold 5,120 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, October 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $305.00, for a total value of $1,561,600.00. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 8,438 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,573,590. This trade represents a 37.76 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Insiders own 1.50% of the company’s stock.

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.