Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) Price Target Lowered to $290.00 at Wells Fargo & Company

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) had its price target decreased by Wells Fargo & Company from $336.00 to $290.00 in a research report report published on Friday, Marketbeat.com reports. Wells Fargo & Company currently has an equal weight rating on the electronics maker’s stock.

Several other equities research analysts have also commented on AYI. Morgan Stanley raised shares of Acuity Brands from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and upped their price target for the company from $304.00 to $370.00 in a report on Tuesday, January 14th. Oppenheimer raised their target price on Acuity Brands from $370.00 to $380.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, January 9th. Robert W. Baird reduced their price target on Acuity Brands from $340.00 to $310.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday. StockNews.com lowered Acuity Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Saturday, March 1st. Finally, William Blair raised shares of Acuity Brands from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, January 2nd. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $330.60.

Acuity Brands Trading Down 2.0 %

Shares of NYSE:AYI opened at $262.44 on Friday. The company has a quick ratio of 2.38, a current ratio of 2.98 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20. Acuity Brands has a 52-week low of $217.64 and a 52-week high of $345.30. The stock has a market cap of $8.12 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.33, a PEG ratio of 1.95 and a beta of 1.41. The business has a 50-day moving average price of $301.88 and a 200-day moving average price of $303.67.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last posted 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 company 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%. Acuity Brands’s revenue for the quarter was up 1.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the firm posted $3.72 EPS. Equities analysts predict that Acuity Brands will post 15.86 EPS for the current year.

Acuity Brands Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 1st. Shareholders of record on Friday, April 18th will be issued a $0.17 dividend. This represents a $0.68 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.26%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 17th. Acuity Brands’s payout ratio is currently 5.01%.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its holdings in Acuity Brands by 0.5% in the 4th 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 in the last quarter. Fuller & Thaler Asset Management Inc. grew its position in shares of Acuity Brands by 0.8% in the fourth quarter. Fuller & Thaler Asset Management Inc. now owns 1,120,979 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $327,471,000 after purchasing an additional 8,705 shares during the period. Wellington Management Group LLP increased its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 10.2% during the fourth 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 in the last quarter. Durable Capital Partners LP raised its position in shares of 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 worth $317,977,000 after purchasing an additional 668,048 shares during the last quarter. Finally, State Street Corp lifted its stake in Acuity Brands by 1.3% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 969,043 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $266,865,000 after buying an additional 12,479 shares in the last quarter. 98.21% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

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.