Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) Shares Bought by Sei Investments Co.

Sei Investments Co. grew its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) by 0.4% during the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 68,671 shares of the electronics maker’s stock after purchasing an additional 284 shares during the quarter. Sei Investments Co.’s holdings in Acuity Brands were worth $20,060,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in the business. World Investment Advisors LLC purchased a new position in Acuity Brands during the third quarter worth about $31,026,000. Smith Group Asset Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Acuity Brands during the 4th quarter valued at about $19,703,000. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. lifted its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 741.8% during the 4th quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 71,744 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $20,959,000 after acquiring an additional 63,221 shares during the period. Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken AB publ boosted its position in shares of Acuity Brands by 345.0% in the fourth quarter. Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken AB publ now owns 72,761 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $21,404,000 after acquiring an additional 56,409 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Raymond James Financial Inc. purchased a new stake in Acuity Brands in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $13,394,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 98.21% of the company’s stock.

Acuity Brands Stock Performance

Acuity Brands stock opened at $268.39 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $8.31 billion, a PE ratio of 19.76, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.95 and a beta of 1.41. Acuity Brands, Inc. has a one year low of $217.64 and a one year high of $345.30. The stock’s 50 day moving average price is $303.24 and its 200 day moving average price is $303.57. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20, a quick ratio of 2.38 and a current ratio of 2.98.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last posted its earnings results 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 business had revenue of $951.60 million for 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 business’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 company posted $3.72 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that Acuity Brands, Inc. will post 15.86 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Acuity Brands Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 1st. Investors of record on Friday, April 18th will be paid a $0.17 dividend. This represents a $0.68 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.25%. Acuity Brands’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 5.01%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research firms have weighed in on AYI. StockNews.com downgraded shares of Acuity Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Saturday, March 1st. Morgan Stanley raised Acuity Brands from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and increased their target price for the stock from $304.00 to $370.00 in a research report on Tuesday, January 14th. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price target on Acuity Brands from $320.00 to $336.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 9th. Robert W. Baird dropped their price target on Acuity Brands from $340.00 to $310.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday. Finally, William Blair raised Acuity Brands from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 2nd. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Acuity Brands has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $339.80.

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.