WINTON GROUP Ltd Acquires New Position in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI)

WINTON GROUP Ltd acquired a new stake in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) in the second quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund acquired 889 shares of the electronics maker’s stock, valued at approximately $215,000.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the business. Wellington Management Group LLP grew its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 4.1% in the fourth quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 1,149,459 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $235,444,000 after purchasing an additional 45,666 shares in the last quarter. American Century Companies Inc. grew its holdings in Acuity Brands by 2.5% during the 2nd quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 835,521 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $201,728,000 after acquiring an additional 20,537 shares in the last quarter. Acadian Asset Management LLC grew its holdings in Acuity Brands by 366.2% during the 2nd quarter. Acadian Asset Management LLC now owns 345,628 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $83,430,000 after acquiring an additional 271,485 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank acquired a new position in Acuity Brands during the 4th quarter worth approximately $68,686,000. Finally, Jupiter Asset Management Ltd. grew its holdings in Acuity Brands by 187.8% during the 2nd quarter. Jupiter Asset Management Ltd. now owns 330,331 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $79,755,000 after acquiring an additional 215,547 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 98.21% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms have commented on AYI. Wells Fargo & Company cut shares of Acuity Brands from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and lowered their price target for the stock from $295.00 to $260.00 in a report on Friday, June 28th. StockNews.com cut shares of Acuity Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, August 27th. Finally, Robert W. Baird lowered their price target on shares of Acuity Brands from $286.00 to $280.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, June 18th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have given a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Acuity Brands currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $279.00.

Acuity Brands Stock Up 1.1 %

Shares of NYSE:AYI opened at $267.91 on Thursday. The company has a market capitalization of $8.24 billion, a PE ratio of 21.78, a P/E/G ratio of 1.62 and a beta of 1.41. The company has a current ratio of 2.77, a quick ratio of 2.15 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.22. Acuity Brands, Inc. has a twelve month low of $156.84 and a twelve month high of $272.74. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $246.12 and a 200-day simple moving average of $252.38.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, June 27th. The electronics maker reported $4.15 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.82 by $0.33. Acuity Brands had a net margin of 10.12% and a return on equity of 20.97%. The business had revenue of $968.10 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $996.52 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $3.50 EPS. The company’s revenue was down 3.2% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities analysts predict that Acuity Brands, Inc. will post 14.26 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Acuity Brands Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, August 1st. Investors of record on Thursday, July 18th were given a $0.15 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, July 18th. This represents a $0.60 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.22%. Acuity Brands’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 4.88%.

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.