Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) to Issue Quarterly Dividend of $0.17

Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) declared a quarterly dividend on Thursday, March 27th, RTT News reports. Stockholders of record on Friday, April 18th will be given a dividend of 0.17 per share by the electronics maker on Thursday, May 1st. This represents a $0.68 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.29%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 17th.

Acuity Brands has increased its dividend by an average of 4.9% per year over the last three years. Acuity Brands has a dividend payout ratio of 3.6% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Analysts expect Acuity Brands to earn $17.42 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.68 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 3.9%.

Acuity Brands Trading Down 0.7 %

AYI stock opened at $238.12 on Tuesday. Acuity Brands has a twelve month low of $216.81 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 stock has a market capitalization of $7.36 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 17.53, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.95 and a beta of 1.43. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $279.53 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $302.04.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, April 3rd. The electronics maker reported $3.73 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.67 by $0.06. Acuity Brands had a return on equity of 19.98% and a net margin of 11.11%. The company had revenue of $1.01 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.03 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $3.38 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 11.1% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts anticipate that Acuity Brands will post 15.86 earnings per share for the current year.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several brokerages recently issued reports on AYI. StockNews.com cut shares of Acuity Brands from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, April 4th. Wells Fargo & Company cut their target price on shares of Acuity Brands from $290.00 to $275.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, April 4th. Morgan Stanley set a $335.00 target price on shares of Acuity Brands in a research note on Friday, April 4th. Oppenheimer increased 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. Finally, Robert W. Baird decreased their target price on shares of Acuity Brands from $310.00 to $295.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, April 4th. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have given a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $317.60.

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.