Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) Given Consensus Recommendation of “Moderate Buy” by Brokerages

Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) has been assigned a consensus recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from the four analysts that are currently covering the stock, MarketBeat reports. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation and two have assigned a buy recommendation to the company. The average 12-month target price among analysts that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $186.60.

A number of research firms have issued reports on AYI. StockNews.com cut shares of Acuity Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, October 13th. Wells Fargo & Company upped their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $180.00 to $200.00 in a research report on Thursday, October 5th. Finally, Robert W. Baird upped their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $170.00 to $180.00 in a research report on Thursday, October 5th.

Acuity Brands Stock Down 0.2 %

AYI stock opened at $169.28 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.25, a current ratio of 2.34 and a quick ratio of 1.72. Acuity Brands has a 52-week low of $149.30 and a 52-week high of $202.90. The company has a 50-day moving average of $167.15 and a two-hundred day moving average of $163.22. The stock has a market capitalization of $5.24 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 15.72, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.35 and a beta of 1.45.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, October 4th. The electronics maker reported $3.97 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.73 by $0.24. Acuity Brands had a net margin of 8.75% and a return on equity of 21.41%. The company had revenue of $1.01 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.02 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $3.72 earnings per share. The business’s quarterly revenue was down 9.0% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts anticipate that Acuity Brands will post 12.55 EPS for the current year.

Acuity Brands Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, November 1st. Investors of record on Wednesday, October 18th were given a $0.13 dividend. This represents a $0.52 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.31%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, October 17th. Acuity Brands’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 4.83%.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in AYI. Raymond James & Associates raised its position in Acuity Brands by 6.2% in the first quarter. Raymond James & Associates now owns 20,688 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $3,916,000 after purchasing an additional 1,200 shares in the last quarter. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Public School Empls Retrmt SYS raised its position in Acuity Brands by 3.0% in the first quarter. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Public School Empls Retrmt SYS now owns 12,834 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $2,429,000 after purchasing an additional 379 shares in the last quarter. BlackRock Inc. raised its position in Acuity Brands by 0.9% in the first quarter. BlackRock Inc. now owns 2,982,396 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $564,568,000 after purchasing an additional 25,598 shares in the last quarter. APG Asset Management N.V. bought a new stake in Acuity Brands during the first quarter worth about $1,395,000. Finally, Great West Life Assurance Co. Can grew its stake in Acuity Brands by 9.1% during the first quarter. Great West Life Assurance Co. Can now owns 19,747 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $3,850,000 after buying an additional 1,647 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 95.58% of the company’s stock.

Acuity Brands Company Profile

Acuity Brands, Inc provides lighting, building management system, location-aware solutions in North America and internationally. The company operates through 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-LightTM, AculuxTM, American Electric Lighting, CycloneTM, Dark to Light, eldoLED, Eureka, Gotham, Healthcare Lighting, Holophane, Hydrel, IndyTM, IOTA, Juno, Lithonia Lighting, Luminaire LEDTM, Luminis, Mark Architectural LightingTM, nLight, OPTOTRONIC, Peerless, RELOC Wiring Solutions, and Sensor SwitchTM brands.