Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) Posts Earnings Results, Beats Expectations By $0.10 EPS

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) announced its earnings results on Wednesday. The electronics maker reported $3.97 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.87 by $0.10, RTT News reports. Acuity Brands had a return on equity of 20.49% and a net margin of 11.00%. The company had revenue of $951.60 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $955.60 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $3.72 earnings per share. Acuity Brands’s quarterly revenue was up 1.8% on a year-over-year basis.

Acuity Brands Stock Down 0.9 %

Shares of AYI stock opened at $304.72 on Wednesday. Acuity Brands has a 12 month low of $204.34 and a 12 month high of $337.99. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $314.79 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $279.68. The stock has a market cap of $9.40 billion, a P/E ratio of 22.67, a P/E/G ratio of 2.09 and a beta of 1.40. The company has a current ratio of 2.72, a quick ratio of 2.16 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.21.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research analysts have weighed in on the stock. Wells Fargo & Company dropped their target price on shares of Acuity Brands from $330.00 to $320.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday. The Goldman Sachs Group upped their price target on Acuity Brands from $266.00 to $303.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 2nd. Robert W. Baird upped their price target on shares of Acuity Brands from $280.00 to $318.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 2nd. William Blair upgraded shares of Acuity Brands from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 2nd. Finally, Oppenheimer lifted their price target on Acuity Brands from $315.00 to $370.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 2nd. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, two have issued a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Acuity Brands presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $323.00.

Insider Activity

In other news, SVP Barry R. Goldman sold 5,120 shares of Acuity Brands stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, October 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $305.00, for a total transaction of $1,561,600.00. Following the sale, the senior vice president now owns 8,438 shares in the company, valued at $2,573,590. This trade represents a 37.76 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Insiders own 2.80% 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.