EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC Grows Stake in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI)

EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC boosted its position in shares of Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) by 16.8% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 891 shares of the electronics maker’s stock after acquiring an additional 128 shares during the quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC’s holdings in Acuity Brands were worth $260,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of AYI. HighTower Advisors LLC increased its position in Acuity Brands by 10.9% in the fourth quarter. HighTower Advisors LLC now owns 3,021 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $883,000 after buying an additional 298 shares in the last quarter. Inspire Advisors LLC increased its holdings in Acuity Brands by 2.6% in the 4th quarter. Inspire Advisors LLC now owns 4,062 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $1,187,000 after acquiring an additional 104 shares in the last quarter. Markel Group Inc. purchased a new position in Acuity Brands during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $876,000. Sage Mountain Advisors LLC bought a new position in shares of Acuity Brands in the fourth quarter worth approximately $502,000. Finally, Daiwa Securities Group Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Acuity Brands in the fourth quarter worth $1,391,000. 98.21% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

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

Acuity Brands Stock Up 2.0 %

Shares of AYI opened at $263.01 on Friday. The business’s 50 day simple moving average is $311.42 and its 200-day simple moving average is $302.66. Acuity Brands, Inc. has a 1 year low of $217.64 and a 1 year high of $345.30. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20, a current ratio of 2.98 and a quick ratio of 2.38. The stock has a market capitalization of $8.14 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.37, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.95 and a beta of 1.41.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, January 8th. The electronics maker reported $3.97 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.87 by $0.10. Acuity Brands had a net margin of 11.11% and a return on equity of 19.98%. The business had revenue of $951.60 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $955.60 million. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $3.72 earnings per share. Acuity Brands’s quarterly revenue was up 1.8% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities 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 disclosed 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. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, February 3rd. This is an increase from Acuity Brands’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.15. This represents a $0.68 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.26%. Acuity Brands’s dividend payout ratio is 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.