Illumine Investment Management LLC Invests $784,000 in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI)

Illumine Investment Management LLC bought a new stake in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI - Free Report) in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm bought 2,682 shares of the electronics maker's stock, valued at approximately $784,000.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of AYI. World Investment Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in Acuity Brands in the third quarter valued at $31,026,000. Smith Group Asset Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Acuity Brands during the 4th quarter worth $19,703,000. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. raised its stake 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 buying an additional 63,221 shares during the last quarter. Proficio Capital Partners LLC acquired a new position in shares of Acuity Brands during the 4th quarter worth $10,412,000. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC raised its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 5.7% during the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 626,810 shares of the electronics maker's stock worth $172,654,000 after buying an additional 34,032 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 98.21% of the company's stock.

Acuity Brands Trading Down 4.2 %

AYI traded down $12.62 during midday trading on Monday, hitting $284.51. The company's stock had a trading volume of 435,350 shares, compared to its average volume of 311,509. The company has a current ratio of 2.98, a quick ratio of 2.38 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20. The firm has a market cap of $8.81 billion, a P/E ratio of 20.95, a PEG ratio of 1.95 and a beta of 1.40. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $316.45 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $301.44. Acuity Brands, Inc. has a 52-week low of $217.64 and a 52-week high of $345.30.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 8th. The electronics maker reported $3.97 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.87 by $0.10. The company had revenue of $951.60 million during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $955.60 million. Acuity Brands had a return on equity of 19.98% and a net margin of 11.11%. The firm's revenue was up 1.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $3.72 EPS. On average, research analysts anticipate that Acuity Brands, Inc. will post 15.86 earnings per share for the current year.

Acuity Brands Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, February 14th. Shareholders of record on Monday, February 3rd were issued a $0.17 dividend. This is a boost from Acuity Brands's previous quarterly dividend of $0.15. The ex-dividend date was Monday, February 3rd. This represents a $0.68 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.24%. Acuity Brands's payout ratio is 5.01%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research firms have recently issued reports on AYI. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price target on Acuity Brands from $320.00 to $336.00 and gave the stock an "equal weight" rating in a research note on Thursday, January 9th. Morgan Stanley upgraded Acuity Brands from an "equal weight" rating to an "overweight" rating and lifted their price objective for the stock from $304.00 to $370.00 in a research report on Tuesday, January 14th. William Blair upgraded Acuity Brands from a "market perform" rating to an "outperform" rating in a research report on Thursday, January 2nd. Oppenheimer lifted their price objective on Acuity Brands from $370.00 to $380.00 and gave the stock an "outperform" rating in a research report on Thursday, January 9th. Finally, StockNews.com cut Acuity Brands from a "strong-buy" rating to a "buy" rating in a research report on Saturday. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have issued a buy rating to the company. According to data from 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.