Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) Holdings Raised by Van ECK Associates Corp

Van ECK Associates Corp grew its stake in shares of Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) by 35.4% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 26,413 shares of the electronics maker’s stock after purchasing an additional 6,901 shares during the period. Van ECK Associates Corp owned about 0.09% of Acuity Brands worth $7,716,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the company. Lightrock Netherlands B.V. purchased a new stake in shares of Acuity Brands during the 4th quarter worth about $2,952,000. Entropy Technologies LP raised its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 47.5% during the 4th quarter. Entropy Technologies LP now owns 2,473 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $722,000 after purchasing an additional 796 shares in the last quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. raised its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 16.3% during the 4th quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. now owns 6,500 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $1,899,000 after purchasing an additional 909 shares in the last quarter. Measured Wealth Private Client Group LLC raised its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 46.2% during the 4th quarter. Measured Wealth Private Client Group LLC now owns 2,110 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $616,000 after purchasing an additional 667 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Hedeker Wealth LLC raised its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 2.0% during the 4th quarter. Hedeker Wealth LLC now owns 19,395 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $5,666,000 after purchasing an additional 383 shares in the last quarter. 98.21% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Acuity Brands Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE AYI opened at $329.51 on Tuesday. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $316.93 and a 200 day moving average price of $295.13. Acuity Brands, Inc. has a 52 week low of $217.64 and a 52 week high of $345.30. 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 stock has a market capitalization of $10.20 billion, a PE ratio of 24.26, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.07 and a beta of 1.40.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, January 8th. The electronics maker reported $3.97 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.87 by $0.10. The company had revenue of $951.60 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $955.60 million. Acuity Brands had a return on equity of 19.98% and a net margin of 11.11%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 1.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $3.72 earnings per share. Analysts predict that Acuity Brands, Inc. will post 15.86 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Acuity Brands Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, February 14th. Investors of record on Monday, February 3rd were issued a dividend of $0.17 per share. This is an increase from Acuity Brands’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.15. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, February 3rd. This represents a $0.68 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.21%. Acuity Brands’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 5.01%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

AYI has been the subject of a number of recent research reports. William Blair raised Acuity Brands from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, January 2nd. Oppenheimer increased their price objective on Acuity Brands from $370.00 to $380.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, January 9th. Morgan Stanley raised Acuity Brands from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and increased their price objective for the company from $304.00 to $370.00 in a report on Tuesday, January 14th. StockNews.com lowered Acuity Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, February 11th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company increased their price objective on Acuity Brands from $320.00 to $336.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Thursday, January 9th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $341.40.

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.