Oppenheimer Increases Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) Price Target to $315.00

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) had its target price increased by investment analysts at Oppenheimer from $250.00 to $315.00 in a note issued to investors on Thursday, Marketbeat.com reports. The brokerage currently has an “outperform” rating on the electronics maker’s stock. Oppenheimer’s price target would indicate a potential upside of 15.76% from the stock’s current price.

Several other equities analysts have also recently weighed in on the stock. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective on shares of Acuity Brands from $200.00 to $236.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, December 19th. Robert W. Baird raised their price target on shares of Acuity Brands from $236.00 to $286.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Tuesday, March 26th. Finally, StockNews.com raised Acuity Brands from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, March 26th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, two have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $289.25.

Acuity Brands Stock Performance

AYI stock opened at $272.12 on Thursday. Acuity Brands has a 1 year low of $149.30 and a 1 year high of $272.74. The stock has a market capitalization of $8.39 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.75, a PEG ratio of 1.93 and a beta of 1.49. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.23, a quick ratio of 1.85 and a current ratio of 2.59. The stock’s fifty day moving average is $251.61 and its two-hundred day moving average is $209.67.

Acuity Brands (NYSE:AYI) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, January 9th. The electronics maker reported $3.72 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.23 by $0.49. The business had revenue of $934.70 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $935.14 million. Acuity Brands had a net margin of 9.81% and a return on equity of 21.22%. The company’s revenue was down 6.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $3.04 earnings per share. On average, research analysts predict that Acuity Brands will post 13.71 EPS for the current year.

Insider Transactions at Acuity Brands

In other Acuity Brands news, CFO Karen J. Holcom sold 7,745 shares of Acuity Brands stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, April 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $262.24, for a total transaction of $2,031,048.80. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 20,287 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,320,062.88. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. In related news, SVP Barry R. Goldman sold 1,900 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, January 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $226.01, for a total transaction of $429,419.00. Following the sale, the senior vice president now owns 8,611 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,946,172.11. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CFO Karen J. Holcom sold 7,745 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, April 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $262.24, for a total value of $2,031,048.80. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 20,287 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,320,062.88. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 15,645 shares of company stock valued at $3,811,128 over the last three months. Corporate insiders own 1.50% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Acuity Brands

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of AYI. Los Angeles Capital Management LLC bought a new position in Acuity Brands in the 1st quarter worth $7,061,000. Kapitalo Investimentos Ltda lifted its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 88.4% in the fourth quarter. Kapitalo Investimentos Ltda now owns 1,396 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $286,000 after buying an additional 655 shares in the last quarter. Quadrature Capital Ltd boosted its stake in Acuity Brands by 14.4% during the 4th quarter. Quadrature Capital Ltd now owns 13,438 shares of the electronics maker’s stock valued at $2,755,000 after purchasing an additional 1,694 shares during the last quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP increased its holdings in 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 buying an additional 45,666 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. grew its stake in shares of Acuity Brands by 23.4% in the fourth quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 99,573 shares of the electronics maker’s stock worth $20,396,000 after acquiring an additional 18,881 shares during the period. 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.