Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) PT Raised to $305.00 at Wells Fargo & Company

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) had its price objective upped by equities researchers at Wells Fargo & Company from $289.00 to $305.00 in a report released on Wednesday, Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has an “equal weight” rating on the electronics maker’s stock. Wells Fargo & Company‘s price objective suggests a potential upside of 2.35% from the stock’s current price.

A number of other brokerages also recently issued reports on AYI. Robert W. Baird boosted their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $280.00 to $318.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday. Oppenheimer boosted their price target on Acuity Brands from $315.00 to $370.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday. Finally, StockNews.com downgraded Acuity Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 27th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $324.00.

Acuity Brands Stock Down 0.7 %

AYI stock opened at $298.00 on Wednesday. The company has a market cap of $9.17 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 24.23, a P/E/G ratio of 1.77 and a beta of 1.41. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.22, a quick ratio of 2.15 and a current ratio of 2.77. The business’s 50-day moving average is $251.82 and its two-hundred day moving average is $254.09. Acuity Brands has a fifty-two week low of $156.84 and a fifty-two week high of $303.04.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 1st. The electronics maker reported $4.30 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.90 by $0.40. The firm had revenue of $1.03 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.02 billion. Acuity Brands had a net margin of 10.12% and a return on equity of 20.97%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 2.2% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $3.74 EPS. As a group, analysts forecast that Acuity Brands will post 14.26 earnings per share for the current year.

Institutional Trading of Acuity Brands

Several institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. New Covenant Trust Company N.A. purchased a new position in Acuity Brands in the 1st quarter worth approximately $27,000. Raleigh Capital Management Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 5,666.7% in the fourth quarter. Raleigh Capital Management Inc. now owns 173 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $35,000 after buying an additional 170 shares in the last quarter. EdgeRock Capital LLC bought a new position in shares of Acuity Brands during the second quarter worth $41,000. Versant Capital Management Inc grew its stake in Acuity Brands by 4,214.3% during the second quarter. Versant Capital Management Inc now owns 302 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $73,000 after acquiring an additional 295 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Covestor Ltd increased its holdings in Acuity Brands by 14.7% in the 1st quarter. Covestor Ltd now owns 475 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $128,000 after acquiring an additional 61 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 98.21% of the company’s stock.

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.