Rhumbline Advisers Has $23.74 Million Stock Holdings in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI)

Rhumbline Advisers cut its holdings in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI - Free Report) by 2.8% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 81,248 shares of the electronics maker's stock after selling 2,349 shares during the quarter. Rhumbline Advisers owned about 0.26% of Acuity Brands worth $23,735,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in AYI. Creative Planning lifted its stake in Acuity Brands by 1.2% in the third quarter. Creative Planning now owns 3,811 shares of the electronics maker's stock valued at $1,050,000 after acquiring an additional 47 shares during the last quarter. Blue Trust Inc. lifted its stake in Acuity Brands by 14.3% in the third quarter. Blue Trust Inc. now owns 1,702 shares of the electronics maker's stock valued at $469,000 after acquiring an additional 213 shares during the last quarter. Ballentine Partners LLC acquired a new stake in Acuity Brands in the third quarter valued at approximately $242,000. State of Alaska Department of Revenue lifted its stake in Acuity Brands by 7.2% in the third quarter. State of Alaska Department of Revenue now owns 3,552 shares of the electronics maker's stock valued at $978,000 after acquiring an additional 240 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Nisa Investment Advisors LLC lifted its stake in Acuity Brands by 0.3% in the third quarter. Nisa Investment Advisors LLC now owns 13,498 shares of the electronics maker's stock valued at $3,717,000 after acquiring an additional 45 shares during the last quarter. 98.21% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several analysts recently issued reports on the stock. Morgan Stanley raised shares of Acuity Brands from an "equal weight" rating to an "overweight" rating and upped their price objective for the stock from $304.00 to $370.00 in a report on Tuesday, January 14th. William Blair raised shares of Acuity Brands from a "market perform" rating to an "outperform" rating in a report on Thursday, January 2nd. StockNews.com raised shares of Acuity Brands from a "buy" rating to a "strong-buy" rating in a report on Wednesday. Wells Fargo & Company upped their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $320.00 to $336.00 and gave the stock an "equal weight" rating in a report on Thursday, January 9th. Finally, Oppenheimer upped their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $370.00 to $380.00 and gave the stock an "outperform" rating in a report on Thursday, January 9th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, three have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average target price of $341.40.

Acuity Brands Stock Performance

Acuity Brands stock traded down $12.09 during mid-day trading on Friday, reaching $309.11. The company had a trading volume of 261,838 shares, compared to its average volume of 221,664. The company has a quick ratio of 2.38, a current ratio of 2.98 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20. Acuity Brands, Inc. has a 52 week low of $217.64 and a 52 week high of $345.30. The company has a 50 day moving average of $317.15 and a 200-day moving average of $297.95. The firm has a market cap of $9.57 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.76, a PEG ratio of 2.03 and a beta of 1.40.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 8th. The electronics maker reported $3.97 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates 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 during 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 business's revenue was up 1.8% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts expect that Acuity Brands, Inc. will post 15.86 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Acuity Brands Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, February 14th. Stockholders of record on Monday, February 3rd were paid a $0.17 dividend. This is a boost 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 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.22%. Acuity Brands's dividend payout ratio is currently 5.01%.

About Acuity Brands

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.