Wells Fargo & Company Cuts Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) Price Target to $290.00

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) had its price target decreased by Wells Fargo & Company from $336.00 to $290.00 in a research note published on Friday, Marketbeat Ratings reports. Wells Fargo & Company currently has an equal weight rating on the electronics maker’s stock.

Other equities research analysts have also recently issued research reports about the company. Morgan Stanley raised Acuity Brands from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and increased their price target for the company from $304.00 to $370.00 in a report on Tuesday, January 14th. StockNews.com lowered Acuity Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Saturday, March 1st. William Blair raised shares of Acuity Brands from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, January 2nd. Robert W. Baird cut their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $340.00 to $310.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday. Finally, Oppenheimer increased their price target on shares of Acuity Brands from $370.00 to $380.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 9th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, Acuity Brands presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $330.60.

Acuity Brands Price Performance

Acuity Brands stock opened at $262.44 on Friday. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $301.88 and a 200-day simple moving average of $303.67. The company has a quick ratio of 2.38, a current ratio of 2.98 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20. The firm has a market capitalization of $8.12 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.33, a PEG ratio of 1.95 and a beta of 1.41. Acuity Brands has a 52-week low of $217.64 and a 52-week high of $345.30.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last announced its quarterly earnings data 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. Acuity Brands had a net margin of 11.11% and a return on equity of 19.98%. The company had revenue of $951.60 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $955.60 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $3.72 EPS. Acuity Brands’s revenue was up 1.8% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities analysts anticipate that Acuity Brands will post 15.86 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Acuity Brands Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 1st. Shareholders of record on Friday, April 18th will be paid a dividend of $0.17 per share. This represents a $0.68 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.26%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, April 17th. Acuity Brands’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 5.01%.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Acuity Brands

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in AYI. ORG Wealth Partners LLC purchased a new position in shares of Acuity Brands during the 4th quarter worth approximately $29,000. Kohmann Bosshard Financial Services LLC acquired a new position in Acuity Brands during the fourth quarter worth $29,000. Westside Investment Management Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Acuity Brands during the third quarter worth $33,000. Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. acquired a new stake in shares of Acuity Brands in the fourth quarter valued at $40,000. Finally, True Wealth Design LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Acuity Brands in the 4th quarter valued at $42,000. 98.21% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

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.