EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC Acquires 128 Shares of Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI)

EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC boosted its stake in shares of Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) by 16.8% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 891 shares of the electronics maker’s stock after buying an additional 128 shares during the quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC’s holdings in Acuity Brands were worth $260,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. World Investment Advisors LLC bought a new stake in shares of Acuity Brands during the third quarter valued at approximately $31,026,000. Smith Group Asset Management LLC bought a new stake in Acuity Brands during the 4th quarter valued at $19,703,000. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. lifted its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 741.8% in the 4th quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 71,744 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $20,959,000 after buying an additional 63,221 shares during the period. Raymond James Financial Inc. bought a new position in shares of Acuity Brands during the 4th quarter worth $13,394,000. Finally, Proficio Capital Partners LLC purchased a new position in shares of Acuity Brands during the fourth quarter valued at $10,412,000. 98.21% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

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

Acuity Brands Stock Performance

Shares of AYI stock opened at $263.01 on Friday. Acuity Brands, Inc. has a 12-month low of $217.64 and a 12-month high of $345.30. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $311.42 and its 200-day simple moving average is $302.66. The company has a current ratio of 2.98, a quick ratio of 2.38 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20. The company has a market cap of $8.14 billion, a PE ratio of 19.37, a PEG ratio of 1.95 and a beta of 1.41.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, January 8th. The electronics maker reported $3.97 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.87 by $0.10. The company had revenue of $951.60 million for 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 firm’s quarterly revenue was up 1.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $3.72 EPS. Analysts expect that Acuity Brands, Inc. will post 15.86 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Acuity Brands Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, February 14th. Shareholders of record on Monday, February 3rd were given a dividend of $0.17 per share. This represents a $0.68 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.26%. The ex-dividend date was Monday, February 3rd. This is an increase from Acuity Brands’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.15. Acuity Brands’s payout ratio is currently 5.01%.

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.