Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) Price Target Lowered to $295.00 at Robert W. Baird

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) had its price target lowered by Robert W. Baird from $310.00 to $295.00 in a research note published on Friday,Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has a neutral rating on the electronics maker’s stock.

Other equities analysts also recently issued reports about the stock. William Blair upgraded shares of Acuity Brands from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 2nd. StockNews.com cut Acuity Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Saturday, March 1st. Oppenheimer lifted their price target 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 decreased their price objective on Acuity Brands from $336.00 to $290.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, March 28th. Finally, Morgan Stanley upgraded Acuity Brands from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and lifted their target price for the company from $304.00 to $370.00 in a research note on Tuesday, January 14th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, Acuity Brands presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $324.60.

Acuity Brands Trading Down 9.4 %

Shares of NYSE AYI opened at $233.15 on Friday. Acuity Brands has a twelve month low of $217.64 and a twelve month high of $345.30. The company has a quick ratio of 2.38, a current ratio of 2.98 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $294.09 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $303.75. The firm 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 1.41.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, April 3rd. The electronics maker reported $3.73 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.67 by $0.06. Acuity Brands had a return on equity of 19.98% and a net margin of 11.11%. The firm had revenue of $1.01 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.03 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $3.38 earnings per share. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 11.1% on a year-over-year basis. Analysts expect that Acuity Brands will post 15.86 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Acuity Brands Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 1st. Investors of record on Friday, April 18th will be paid a dividend of $0.17 per share. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, April 17th. This represents a $0.68 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.29%. Acuity Brands’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 5.01%.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Acuity Brands

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in AYI. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 0.5% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 3,104,542 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $906,930,000 after acquiring an additional 16,407 shares during the last quarter. Fuller & Thaler Asset Management Inc. boosted its stake in Acuity Brands by 0.8% in the 4th quarter. Fuller & Thaler Asset Management Inc. now owns 1,120,979 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $327,471,000 after purchasing an additional 8,705 shares in the last quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP grew its position in Acuity Brands by 10.2% during the 4th quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 1,117,489 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $326,452,000 after purchasing an additional 103,162 shares during the last quarter. Durable Capital Partners LP increased its stake in Acuity Brands by 158.9% during the 4th quarter. Durable Capital Partners LP now owns 1,088,477 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $317,977,000 after purchasing an additional 668,048 shares in the last quarter. Finally, State Street Corp raised its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 1.3% in the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 969,043 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $266,865,000 after buying an additional 12,479 shares during the last quarter. 98.21% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

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.