Robert W. Baird Cuts Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) Price Target to $310.00

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) had its target price reduced by Robert W. Baird from $340.00 to $310.00 in a report released on Thursday morning,Benzinga reports. Robert W. Baird currently has a neutral rating on the electronics maker’s stock.

Several other analysts have also issued reports on the stock. William Blair upgraded shares of Acuity Brands from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 2nd. Oppenheimer upped their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $370.00 to $380.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 9th. Wells Fargo & Company upped their target price on Acuity Brands from $320.00 to $336.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Thursday, January 9th. Morgan Stanley upgraded Acuity Brands from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and upped their price objective for the company from $304.00 to $370.00 in a research note on Tuesday, January 14th. Finally, StockNews.com downgraded Acuity Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Saturday, March 1st. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $330.60.

Acuity Brands Price Performance

Shares of NYSE AYI opened at $262.44 on Thursday. The stock has a market cap of $8.12 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.33, a PEG ratio of 1.95 and a beta of 1.41. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20, a quick ratio of 2.38 and a current ratio of 2.98. Acuity Brands has a fifty-two week low of $217.64 and a fifty-two week high of $345.30. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $301.88 and its 200 day simple moving average is $304.04.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, January 8th. The electronics maker reported $3.97 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.87 by $0.10. Acuity Brands had a return on equity of 19.98% and a net margin of 11.11%. The company had revenue of $951.60 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $955.60 million. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $3.72 earnings per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 1.8% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, research analysts anticipate that Acuity Brands will post 15.86 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Acuity Brands Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 1st. Shareholders of record on Friday, April 18th will be given a $0.17 dividend. This represents a $0.68 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.26%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 17th. Acuity Brands’s dividend payout ratio is currently 5.01%.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in AYI. Ballentine Partners LLC lifted its holdings in Acuity Brands by 3.9% during the fourth quarter. Ballentine Partners LLC now owns 911 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $266,000 after purchasing an additional 34 shares during the last quarter. Janney Montgomery Scott LLC raised its position in shares of Acuity Brands by 0.8% in the fourth quarter. Janney Montgomery Scott LLC now owns 4,142 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $1,210,000 after purchasing an additional 34 shares during the period. Versant Capital Management Inc lifted its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 16.3% during the 4th quarter. Versant Capital Management Inc now owns 293 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $86,000 after buying an additional 41 shares in the last quarter. Venturi Wealth Management LLC boosted its holdings in Acuity Brands by 13.1% in the 4th quarter. Venturi Wealth Management LLC now owns 398 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $116,000 after buying an additional 46 shares during the period. Finally, CIBC Asset Management Inc grew its stake in Acuity Brands by 5.2% in the 4th quarter. CIBC Asset Management Inc now owns 951 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $278,000 after buying an additional 47 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 98.21% of the company’s stock.

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.