Versor Investments LP Takes $474,000 Position in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI)

Versor Investments LP purchased a new stake in shares of Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI - Free Report) during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm purchased 1,623 shares of the electronics maker's stock, valued at approximately $474,000.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. State Street Corp boosted its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 1.3% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 969,043 shares of the electronics maker's stock valued at $266,865,000 after purchasing an additional 12,479 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 5.7% during the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 626,810 shares of the electronics maker's stock valued at $172,654,000 after purchasing an additional 34,032 shares in the last quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 7.5% during the third quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 437,745 shares of the electronics maker's stock valued at $120,551,000 after purchasing an additional 30,581 shares in the last quarter. Seizert Capital Partners LLC boosted its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 2.0% during the third quarter. Seizert Capital Partners LLC now owns 281,308 shares of the electronics maker's stock valued at $77,469,000 after purchasing an additional 5,435 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Captrust Financial Advisors boosted its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 9.3% during the third quarter. Captrust Financial Advisors now owns 269,043 shares of the electronics maker's stock valued at $74,092,000 after purchasing an additional 22,781 shares in the last quarter. 98.21% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of analysts have recently commented on AYI shares. Oppenheimer lifted their price target on Acuity Brands from $370.00 to $380.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research note on Thursday, January 9th. StockNews.com lowered Acuity Brands from a "strong-buy" rating to a "buy" rating in a research note on Saturday. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective 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. William Blair raised Acuity Brands from a "market perform" rating to an "outperform" rating in a research note on Thursday, January 2nd. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised 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 note on Tuesday, January 14th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the company's stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $341.40.

Acuity Brands Trading Down 4.2 %

AYI stock traded down $12.62 during mid-day trading on Monday, reaching $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 market cap of $8.81 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 20.95, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.95 and a beta of 1.40. The business's 50 day moving average price is $316.45 and its 200 day moving average price is $301.44. The company has a current ratio of 2.98, a quick ratio of 2.38 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20. Acuity Brands, Inc. has a 12 month low of $217.64 and a 12 month high of $345.30.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI - Get Free Report) last issued 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 business had revenue of $951.60 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate 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 for the quarter was up 1.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $3.72 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts predict that Acuity Brands, Inc. will post 15.86 EPS for the current year.

Acuity Brands Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced 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 an increase from Acuity Brands's previous quarterly dividend of $0.15. This represents a $0.68 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.24%. 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.