1,012 Shares in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) Acquired by EP Wealth Advisors LLC

EP Wealth Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) during the 3rd quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund purchased 1,012 shares of the electronics maker’s stock, valued at approximately $279,000.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of AYI. Texas Permanent School Fund Corp raised its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 8.0% in the 2nd quarter. Texas Permanent School Fund Corp now owns 28,846 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $6,965,000 after acquiring an additional 2,138 shares during the period. Hancock Whitney Corp increased its holdings in Acuity Brands by 42.0% in the 3rd quarter. Hancock Whitney Corp now owns 6,477 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $1,784,000 after purchasing an additional 1,917 shares in the last quarter. Aigen Investment Management LP acquired a new stake in Acuity Brands in the 3rd quarter valued at $484,000. McKinley Carter Wealth Services Inc. raised its position in Acuity Brands by 15.0% in the third quarter. McKinley Carter Wealth Services Inc. now owns 21,285 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $5,862,000 after purchasing an additional 2,773 shares during the period. Finally, Landscape Capital Management L.L.C. acquired a new position in shares of Acuity Brands during the third quarter worth about $813,000. 98.21% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insider Activity

In other Acuity Brands news, SVP Barry R. Goldman sold 5,120 shares of Acuity Brands stock in a transaction 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 completion of the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 8,438 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,573,590. The trade was a 37.76 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this link. Company insiders own 1.50% of the company’s stock.

Acuity Brands Trading Down 1.6 %

AYI opened at $317.74 on Friday. Acuity Brands, Inc. has a 12-month low of $196.38 and a 12-month high of $337.99. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.21, a current ratio of 2.72 and a quick ratio of 2.16. The stock has a market capitalization of $9.81 billion, a PE ratio of 23.93, a P/E/G ratio of 2.09 and a beta of 1.39. The firm’s fifty day moving average price is $315.12 and its 200 day moving average price is $273.07.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 1st. The electronics maker reported $4.30 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.90 by $0.40. The business 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%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 2.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $3.74 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts expect that Acuity Brands, Inc. will post 15.51 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Acuity Brands Dividend Announcement

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

Analysts Set New Price Targets

AYI has been the subject of a number of recent research reports. Oppenheimer increased their target price 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 lifted their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $289.00 to $305.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 2nd. The Goldman Sachs Group upped their target price on shares of Acuity Brands from $266.00 to $303.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 2nd. StockNews.com raised shares of Acuity Brands from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 31st. Finally, Robert W. Baird upped their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $280.00 to $318.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 2nd. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, one has given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $324.00.

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.