Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) Cut to Hold at StockNews.com

StockNews.com downgraded shares of Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) from a buy rating to a hold rating in a research note published on Friday.

Other equities analysts have also recently issued research reports about the company. Oppenheimer boosted their price objective on Acuity Brands from $370.00 to $380.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, January 9th. Wells Fargo & Company dropped their target price on shares of Acuity Brands from $290.00 to $275.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday. William Blair upgraded Acuity Brands from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 2nd. Morgan Stanley raised shares of Acuity Brands from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and raised their target price for the stock from $304.00 to $370.00 in a research note on Tuesday, January 14th. Finally, Robert W. Baird lowered their price target on shares of Acuity Brands from $310.00 to $295.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $324.60.

Acuity Brands Trading Down 9.4 %

Acuity Brands stock opened at $233.15 on Friday. The stock has a market cap of $7.22 billion, a PE ratio of 17.17, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.95 and a beta of 1.43. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20, a quick ratio of 2.38 and a current ratio of 2.98. The stock has a 50-day moving average of $294.09 and a two-hundred day moving average of $304.28. Acuity Brands has a one year low of $217.64 and a one year high of $345.30.

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

Acuity Brands Announces Dividend

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

Institutional Trading of Acuity Brands

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Wealth Enhancement Advisory Services LLC grew its stake in Acuity Brands by 192.8% during the 4th quarter. Wealth Enhancement Advisory Services LLC now owns 5,615 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $1,640,000 after purchasing an additional 3,697 shares in the last quarter. NorthCrest Asset Manangement LLC increased its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 1.7% in the 4th quarter. NorthCrest Asset Manangement LLC now owns 7,245 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $2,116,000 after acquiring an additional 121 shares during the period. Lansforsakringar Fondforvaltning AB publ acquired a new position in Acuity Brands in the fourth quarter valued at $8,601,000. Menard Financial Group LLC acquired a new position in Acuity Brands in the 4th quarter valued at about $79,000. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 63.0% in the fourth quarter. Jefferies Financial Group Inc. now owns 1,221 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $357,000 after purchasing an additional 472 shares during the period. 98.21% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

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.