Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) Short Interest Update

Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) was the recipient of a large decline in short interest during the month of September. As of September 30th, there was short interest totalling 1,210,000 shares, a decline of 9.0% from the September 15th total of 1,330,000 shares. Based on an average daily volume of 235,000 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is presently 5.1 days. Currently, 3.9% of the company’s shares are short sold.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of brokerages have issued reports on AYI. The Goldman Sachs Group raised their price objective 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. Oppenheimer raised their price target on Acuity Brands from $315.00 to $370.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 2nd. Robert W. Baird upped their price objective on Acuity Brands from $280.00 to $318.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 2nd. Wells Fargo & Company raised their target price on Acuity Brands from $289.00 to $305.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 2nd. Finally, StockNews.com cut Acuity Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 27th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $324.00.

Acuity Brands Stock Up 0.6 %

Shares of AYI traded up $1.82 on Thursday, hitting $306.82. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 234,620 shares, compared to its average volume of 256,073. The firm’s fifty day moving average price is $264.08 and its 200-day moving average price is $256.44. Acuity Brands has a fifty-two week low of $156.84 and a fifty-two week high of $312.20. The company has a quick ratio of 2.16, a current ratio of 2.72 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.21. The firm has a market capitalization of $9.44 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 24.80, a P/E/G ratio of 1.97 and a beta of 1.41.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 1st. The electronics maker reported $4.30 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.90 by $0.40. The company had revenue of $1.03 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.02 billion. Acuity Brands had a net margin of 11.00% and a return on equity of 20.49%. The firm’s revenue was up 2.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $3.74 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts expect that Acuity Brands will post 15.48 EPS for the current year.

Acuity Brands Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, November 1st. Investors of record on Friday, October 18th will be issued a dividend of $0.15 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, October 18th. This represents a $0.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.20%. Acuity Brands’s payout ratio is presently 4.88%.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Acuity Brands

A number of large investors have recently bought and sold shares of AYI. V Square Quantitative Management LLC acquired a new position in Acuity Brands during the third quarter worth $35,000. Twelve Points Wealth Management LLC boosted its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 5.6% during the 3rd quarter. Twelve Points Wealth Management LLC now owns 3,778 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $1,040,000 after buying an additional 202 shares during the last quarter. McKinley Carter Wealth Services Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 15.0% in the 3rd quarter. McKinley Carter Wealth Services Inc. now owns 21,285 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $5,862,000 after acquiring an additional 2,773 shares in the last quarter. Creative Planning increased its position in shares of Acuity Brands by 1.2% in the third quarter. Creative Planning now owns 3,811 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $1,050,000 after acquiring an additional 47 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Ritholtz Wealth Management raised its holdings in Acuity Brands by 14.4% during the third quarter. Ritholtz Wealth Management now owns 4,824 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $1,329,000 after acquiring an additional 606 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds 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.