Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) Downgraded by StockNews.com to “Buy”

StockNews.com downgraded shares of Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) from a strong-buy rating to a buy rating in a research note released on Tuesday morning.

A number of other analysts have also issued reports on AYI. Oppenheimer lifted their price target on shares of Acuity Brands from $370.00 to $380.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 9th. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $320.00 to $336.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Thursday, January 9th. William Blair raised shares of Acuity Brands from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, January 2nd. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised shares of Acuity Brands from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and lifted their price objective for the stock from $304.00 to $370.00 in a report on Tuesday, January 14th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $341.40.

Acuity Brands Stock Up 0.4 %

Shares of NYSE:AYI opened at $325.13 on Tuesday. The company has a current ratio of 2.98, a quick ratio of 2.38 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $316.80 and a 200 day simple moving average of $293.73. The firm has a market cap of $10.07 billion, a PE ratio of 23.94, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.07 and a beta of 1.40. Acuity Brands has a 12-month low of $217.64 and a 12-month high of $345.30.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 8th. The electronics maker reported $3.97 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.87 by $0.10. The business had revenue of $951.60 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $955.60 million. Acuity Brands had a net margin of 11.11% and a return on equity of 19.98%. The business’s revenue was up 1.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $3.72 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that Acuity Brands will post 15.86 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Acuity Brands Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Stockholders of record on Monday, February 3rd will be issued a dividend of $0.17 per share. This is an increase from Acuity Brands’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.15. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, February 3rd. This represents a $0.68 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.21%. Acuity Brands’s payout ratio is 5.01%.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Acuity Brands

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of AYI. UMB Bank n.a. boosted its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 517.6% during the third quarter. UMB Bank n.a. now owns 105 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $29,000 after acquiring an additional 88 shares during the period. Creative Planning boosted its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 1.2% during the third quarter. Creative Planning now owns 3,811 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $1,050,000 after acquiring an additional 47 shares during the period. McKinley Carter Wealth Services Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 15.0% during the third quarter. McKinley Carter Wealth Services Inc. now owns 21,285 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $5,862,000 after acquiring an additional 2,773 shares during the period. Twelve Points Wealth Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 5.6% during the third quarter. Twelve Points Wealth Management LLC now owns 3,778 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $1,040,000 after acquiring an additional 202 shares during the period. Finally, V Square Quantitative Management LLC acquired a new stake in Acuity Brands in the third quarter worth about $35,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 98.21% of the company’s stock.

About Acuity Brands

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.