Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) Shares Sold by Berkeley Capital Partners LLC

Berkeley Capital Partners LLC reduced its holdings in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) by 3.2% during the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund owned 2,980 shares of the electronics maker’s stock after selling 100 shares during the quarter. Berkeley Capital Partners LLC’s holdings in Acuity Brands were worth $871,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Other large investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Oddo BHF Asset Management Sas acquired a new stake in Acuity Brands in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $3,849,000. Hancock Whitney Corp boosted its stake in Acuity Brands by 42.0% during the 3rd quarter. Hancock Whitney Corp now owns 6,477 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $1,784,000 after purchasing an additional 1,917 shares in the last quarter. Landscape Capital Management L.L.C. bought a new position in Acuity Brands during the 3rd quarter valued at $813,000. Merit Financial Group LLC bought a new position in Acuity Brands during the 4th quarter valued at $232,000. Finally, Integrated Investment Consultants LLC bought a new position in Acuity Brands during the 3rd quarter valued at $538,000. 98.21% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts have issued reports on the company. William Blair raised Acuity Brands from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 2nd. Wells Fargo & Company increased their price target on Acuity Brands from $320.00 to $336.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 9th. Oppenheimer increased their price target on Acuity Brands from $370.00 to $380.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 9th. StockNews.com lowered Acuity Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Saturday, March 1st. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised Acuity Brands from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and raised their price objective for the stock from $304.00 to $370.00 in a research note on Tuesday, January 14th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, Acuity Brands has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $341.40.

Acuity Brands Stock Performance

AYI opened at $266.82 on Thursday. The firm has a market cap of $8.26 billion, a PE ratio of 19.65, a P/E/G ratio of 1.95 and a beta of 1.41. 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 $308.87 and a 200-day simple moving average of $302.96. Acuity Brands, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $217.64 and a fifty-two week high of $345.30.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, January 8th. The electronics maker reported $3.97 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating 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 return on equity of 19.98% and a net margin of 11.11%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 1.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $3.72 earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts predict that Acuity Brands, Inc. will post 15.86 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Acuity Brands Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, February 14th. Stockholders of record on Monday, February 3rd were issued a $0.17 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, February 3rd. This represents a $0.68 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.25%. This is a positive change from Acuity Brands’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.15. Acuity Brands’s dividend payout ratio is presently 5.01%.

Acuity Brands 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.