State Street Corp Raises Stake in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI)

State Street Corp increased its stake in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) by 1.3% during the third quarter, according to its most recent filing with the SEC. The fund owned 969,043 shares of the electronics maker’s stock after buying an additional 12,479 shares during the quarter. State Street Corp’s holdings in Acuity Brands were worth $266,865,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Stifel Financial Corp boosted its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 12.3% in the 3rd quarter. Stifel Financial Corp now owns 7,642 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $2,105,000 after buying an additional 835 shares during the last quarter. Systematic Financial Management LP raised its stake in Acuity Brands by 7.5% in the 3rd quarter. Systematic Financial Management LP now owns 27,706 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $7,630,000 after acquiring an additional 1,940 shares during the period. Quantinno Capital Management LP raised its stake in Acuity Brands by 20.6% in the 3rd quarter. Quantinno Capital Management LP now owns 34,663 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $9,546,000 after acquiring an additional 5,921 shares during the period. Quarry LP raised its stake in Acuity Brands by 229.7% in the 3rd quarter. Quarry LP now owns 244 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $67,000 after acquiring an additional 170 shares during the period. Finally, Millburn Ridgefield Corp bought a new stake in Acuity Brands in the 3rd quarter valued at about $112,000. 98.21% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities research analysts recently issued reports on AYI shares. Oppenheimer boosted their price objective on Acuity Brands from $315.00 to $370.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 2nd. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price objective on Acuity Brands from $289.00 to $305.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 2nd. Robert W. Baird upped their price target on Acuity Brands from $280.00 to $318.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 2nd. The Goldman Sachs Group upped their price target on Acuity Brands from $266.00 to $303.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 2nd. Finally, StockNews.com upgraded Acuity Brands from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 31st. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, one has issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $324.00.

Acuity Brands Trading Down 0.6 %

Shares of AYI opened at $319.41 on Wednesday. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $313.76 and its 200-day moving average price is $271.96. Acuity Brands, Inc. has a twelve month low of $187.64 and a twelve month high of $337.99. The stock has a market cap of $9.86 billion, a PE ratio of 23.75, a P/E/G ratio of 2.09 and a beta of 1.39. The company has a quick ratio of 2.16, a current ratio of 2.72 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.21.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 1st. The electronics maker reported $4.30 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.90 by $0.40. The company had revenue of $1.03 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.02 billion. Acuity Brands had a net margin of 11.00% and a return on equity of 20.49%. Acuity Brands’s revenue for the quarter was up 2.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $3.74 earnings per share. On average, equities analysts forecast that Acuity Brands, Inc. will post 15.51 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Acuity Brands Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 1st. Investors of record on Friday, October 18th were given a $0.15 dividend. This represents a $0.60 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.19%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, October 18th. Acuity Brands’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 4.46%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, SVP Barry R. Goldman sold 5,120 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, October 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $305.00, for a total value of $1,561,600.00. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 8,438 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,573,590. This represents a 37.76 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. 1.50% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

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.