Jackson Creek Investment Advisors LLC Increases Position in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI)

Jackson Creek Investment Advisors LLC boosted its position in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI - Free Report) by 99.7% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 1,931 shares of the electronics maker's stock after purchasing an additional 964 shares during the quarter. Jackson Creek Investment Advisors LLC's holdings in Acuity Brands were worth $564,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. ORG Wealth Partners LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Acuity Brands in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $29,000. Kohmann Bosshard Financial Services LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Acuity Brands in the 4th quarter worth $29,000. Westside Investment Management Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Acuity Brands during the 3rd quarter worth $33,000. Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. acquired a new position in shares of Acuity Brands during the 4th quarter valued at about $40,000. Finally, UMB Bank n.a. boosted its position in shares of Acuity Brands by 63.8% during the 4th quarter. UMB Bank n.a. now owns 172 shares of the electronics maker's stock valued at $50,000 after acquiring an additional 67 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 98.21% of the company's stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

AYI has been the topic of a number of analyst reports. Morgan Stanley raised shares of Acuity Brands from an "equal weight" rating to an "overweight" rating and lifted their target price for the stock from $304.00 to $370.00 in a research note on Tuesday, January 14th. William Blair raised shares of Acuity Brands from a "market perform" rating to an "outperform" rating in a research report on Thursday, January 2nd. Wells Fargo & Company upped 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. StockNews.com cut Acuity Brands from a "strong-buy" rating to a "buy" rating in a research note on Saturday, March 1st. Finally, Oppenheimer boosted their price target on shares of Acuity Brands from $370.00 to $380.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research note on Thursday, January 9th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Acuity Brands currently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $341.40.

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Acuity Brands Trading Down 1.5 %

NYSE AYI traded down $4.12 during trading on Wednesday, hitting $263.93. The stock had a trading volume of 427,635 shares, compared to its average volume of 262,377. The company has a market capitalization of $8.17 billion, a PE ratio of 19.43, a PEG ratio of 1.95 and a beta of 1.41. Acuity Brands, Inc. has a twelve month low of $217.64 and a twelve month high of $345.30. 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 firm has a 50 day moving average price of $313.58 and a 200 day moving average price of $302.82.

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

Acuity Brands Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, February 14th. Investors of record on Monday, February 3rd were paid a dividend of $0.17 per share. This represents a $0.68 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.26%. This is a boost from Acuity Brands's previous quarterly dividend of $0.15. The ex-dividend date was Monday, February 3rd. Acuity Brands's payout ratio is presently 5.01%.

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.