Profund Advisors LLC Has $203,000 Stake in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI)

Profund Advisors LLC cut its position in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) by 19.9% in the 2nd quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 839 shares of the electronics maker’s stock after selling 208 shares during the quarter. Profund Advisors LLC’s holdings in Acuity Brands were worth $203,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in AYI. New Covenant Trust Company N.A. acquired a new position in Acuity Brands during the first quarter valued at approximately $27,000. Raleigh Capital Management Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 5,666.7% during the 4th quarter. Raleigh Capital Management Inc. now owns 173 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $35,000 after buying an additional 170 shares in the last quarter. EdgeRock Capital LLC bought a new stake in shares of Acuity Brands during the 2nd quarter worth $41,000. Versant Capital Management Inc boosted its stake in Acuity Brands by 4,214.3% in the second quarter. Versant Capital Management Inc now owns 302 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $73,000 after buying an additional 295 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Covestor Ltd grew its position in Acuity Brands by 14.7% in the first quarter. Covestor Ltd now owns 475 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $128,000 after acquiring an additional 61 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 98.21% of the company’s stock.

Acuity Brands Stock Up 0.1 %

Shares of NYSE AYI opened at $270.00 on Monday. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $248.47 and a 200 day simple moving average of $253.04. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.22, a current ratio of 2.77 and a quick ratio of 2.15. Acuity Brands, Inc. has a 1 year low of $156.84 and a 1 year high of $275.63. The firm has a market cap of $8.31 billion, a PE ratio of 21.95, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.77 and a beta of 1.41.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, June 27th. The electronics maker reported $4.15 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.82 by $0.33. The company had revenue of $968.10 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $996.52 million. Acuity Brands had a net margin of 10.12% and a return on equity of 20.97%. Acuity Brands’s revenue was down 3.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $3.50 earnings per share. On average, research analysts forecast that Acuity Brands, Inc. will post 14.26 EPS for the current year.

Acuity Brands Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, November 1st. Investors of record on Friday, October 18th will be issued a $0.15 dividend. This represents a $0.60 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.22%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, October 18th. Acuity Brands’s payout ratio is presently 4.88%.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

AYI has been the subject of a number of research reports. Robert W. Baird dropped their target price on shares of Acuity Brands from $286.00 to $280.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, June 18th. Wells Fargo & Company increased their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $260.00 to $289.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, September 24th. Finally, StockNews.com lowered shares of Acuity Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, August 27th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have given a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $286.25.

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.