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

Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) was the recipient of a large growth in short interest during the month of March. As of March 15th, there was short interest totalling 991,500 shares, a growth of 28.6% from the February 28th total of 771,200 shares. Currently, 3.2% of the shares of the company are short sold. Based on an average daily volume of 339,500 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is presently 2.9 days.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Acuity Brands

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

Acuity Brands Trading Up 0.2 %

Acuity Brands stock traded up $0.54 during mid-day trading on Tuesday, hitting $263.89. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 425,617 shares, compared to its average volume of 278,808. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20, a quick ratio of 2.38 and a current ratio of 2.98. The company has a 50 day moving average of $299.10 and a 200-day moving average of $304.54. Acuity Brands has a one year low of $217.64 and a one year high of $345.30. The stock has a market cap of $8.17 billion, a PE ratio of 19.43, a P/E/G ratio of 1.95 and a beta of 1.41.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last announced its quarterly earnings data 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. The company had revenue of $951.60 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $955.60 million. Acuity Brands had a net margin of 11.11% and a return on equity of 19.98%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 1.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $3.72 EPS. On average, research analysts anticipate that Acuity Brands will post 15.86 EPS for the current year.

Acuity Brands Dividend Announcement

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

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of brokerages have recently issued reports on AYI. Oppenheimer boosted their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $370.00 to $380.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 9th. Robert W. Baird reduced their target price on shares of Acuity Brands from $340.00 to $310.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, March 27th. William Blair raised shares of Acuity Brands from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, January 2nd. StockNews.com lowered shares of Acuity Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Saturday, March 1st. Finally, Morgan Stanley upgraded shares of Acuity Brands from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and raised their price objective for the company from $304.00 to $370.00 in a research report on Tuesday, January 14th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $330.60.

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.