New Age Alpha Advisors LLC Takes $174,000 Position in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI)

New Age Alpha Advisors LLC bought a new position in shares of Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The firm bought 595 shares of the electronics maker’s stock, valued at approximately $174,000.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Ballentine Partners LLC raised its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 3.9% during the fourth quarter. Ballentine Partners LLC now owns 911 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $266,000 after acquiring an additional 34 shares during the period. Janney Montgomery Scott LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 0.8% in the fourth quarter. Janney Montgomery Scott LLC now owns 4,142 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $1,210,000 after purchasing an additional 34 shares in the last quarter. Versant Capital Management Inc boosted its position in shares of Acuity Brands by 16.3% during the fourth quarter. Versant Capital Management Inc now owns 293 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $86,000 after buying an additional 41 shares during the period. Venturi Wealth Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 13.1% during the fourth quarter. Venturi Wealth Management LLC now owns 398 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $116,000 after buying an additional 46 shares in the last quarter. Finally, CIBC Asset Management Inc raised its position in Acuity Brands by 5.2% in the 4th quarter. CIBC Asset Management Inc now owns 951 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $278,000 after buying an additional 47 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 98.21% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities analysts have recently weighed in on AYI shares. William Blair raised shares of Acuity Brands from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 2nd. StockNews.com lowered shares of Acuity Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Saturday, March 1st. Oppenheimer increased their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $370.00 to $380.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 9th. Wells Fargo & Company decreased their price objective on Acuity Brands from $336.00 to $290.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Friday, March 28th. Finally, Robert W. Baird reduced their price target on Acuity Brands from $340.00 to $310.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, March 27th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Acuity Brands has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $330.60.

Acuity Brands Stock Performance

AYI opened at $266.79 on Thursday. 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 stock has a market cap of $8.26 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.65, a PEG ratio of 1.95 and a beta of 1.41. Acuity Brands, Inc. has a 12-month low of $217.64 and a 12-month high of $345.30. The business has a 50 day moving average of $297.70 and a 200-day moving average of $304.27.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, January 8th. The electronics maker reported $3.97 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.87 by $0.10. The firm had revenue of $951.60 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $955.60 million. Acuity Brands had a net margin of 11.11% and a return on equity of 19.98%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 1.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $3.72 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts expect that Acuity Brands, Inc. will post 15.86 earnings per share for the current year.

Acuity Brands Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 1st. Shareholders of record on Friday, April 18th will be issued a $0.17 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 17th. This represents a $0.68 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.25%. Acuity Brands’s dividend payout ratio is currently 5.01%.

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.