First City Capital Management Inc. Increases Stock Position in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI)

First City Capital Management Inc. boosted its position in Acuity Brands, Inc. (NYSE:AYI) by 3.3% during the second quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 2,783 shares of the electronics maker’s stock after acquiring an additional 90 shares during the quarter. First City Capital Management Inc.’s holdings in Acuity Brands were worth $672,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of AYI. Wellington Management Group LLP grew its position in shares of Acuity Brands by 4.1% in the 4th quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 1,149,459 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $235,444,000 after acquiring an additional 45,666 shares in the last quarter. American Century Companies Inc. increased its stake in Acuity Brands by 2.5% during the second quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 835,521 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $201,728,000 after purchasing an additional 20,537 shares during the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP raised its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 3.4% during the second quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 629,893 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $152,085,000 after purchasing an additional 20,832 shares during the period. Pacer Advisors Inc. lifted its position in shares of Acuity Brands by 35.7% in the 2nd quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 407,164 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $98,306,000 after buying an additional 107,171 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Acadian Asset Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Acuity Brands by 366.2% in the 2nd quarter. Acadian Asset Management LLC now owns 345,628 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $83,430,000 after buying an additional 271,485 shares during the period. 98.21% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities analysts have issued reports on AYI shares. Wells Fargo & Company cut shares of Acuity Brands from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and cut their target price for the stock from $295.00 to $260.00 in a report on Friday, June 28th. Robert W. Baird lowered their price objective on Acuity Brands from $286.00 to $280.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, June 18th. Finally, StockNews.com cut Acuity Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 27th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have given a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $279.00.

Acuity Brands Stock Performance

Shares of AYI stock opened at $272.23 on Friday. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $247.25 and a 200 day simple moving average of $252.59. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.22, a current ratio of 2.77 and a quick ratio of 2.15. The firm has a market capitalization of $8.38 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.13, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.62 and a beta of 1.41. Acuity Brands, Inc. has a 12-month low of $156.84 and a 12-month high of $273.36.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, June 27th. The electronics maker reported $4.15 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.82 by $0.33. The company had revenue of $968.10 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $996.52 million. Acuity Brands had a return on equity of 20.97% and a net margin of 10.12%. The company’s quarterly revenue was down 3.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the company earned $3.50 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that Acuity Brands, Inc. will post 14.26 EPS for the current year.

Acuity Brands Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, August 1st. Stockholders of record on Thursday, July 18th were issued a $0.15 dividend. This represents a $0.60 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.22%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, July 18th. Acuity Brands’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 4.88%.

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.