Acuity Brands Inc (NYSE: AYI)
Acuity Brands stock is having a bad day on the NYSE despite the company reporting solid fourth-quarter earnings that were above Wall Street expectations.
The Georgia-based firm said higher inputs costs for items such as electronic components, wages, freight, and commodity-related items like steel greatly impacted its operating profit and margin during the quarter.
Shares of the company were down $16.02, or 10.31% to $139.46 at 10.55 a.m. The stock has lost nearly 23% since the beginning of the year.
AYI Earnings
The company posted net income of $108.2 million, or $2.70 per share, compared with $90.5 million, or $2.15 per share, in the year-ago period. Earnings, adjusted for one-time items were $2.68 per share.
Revenue was $1.06 billion for the quarter, up from $957.60 million in the same period last year. Analysts on average were expecting adjusted earnings of $2.56 per share on revenue of $1.01 billion. Input costs totaled to $648.9 million, up 17.8% year over year.
Acuity Brands CEO Comments
Vernon J. Nagel, Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer of Acuity Brands, commented, “Our fourth quarter performance was solid, particularly against the backdrop of a challenging lighting market where larger commercial projects remained soft and input costs rose significantly. Net sales growth of 11 percent was robust and was driven primarily by volume growth in our Contractor Select portfolio, Atrius-enabled luminaires, and Holophane solutions. Overall, we experienced solid growth in net sales in most channels and geographies. This was the first time in our history that we generated quarterly net sales in excess of $1 billion.”
Acuity Brands, Inc Company Profile
Acuity Brands, Inc. provides lighting and building management solutions and services for commercial, institutional, industrial, infrastructure, and residential applications in North America and internationally.
The company offers lighting and controls products and solutions, such as recessed, surface, and suspended lighting; down, decorative, emergency and exit, track, day, special-use, street and roadway, parking garage, landscape, and underwater lighting; area pedestrian, flood, and decorative site lighting; occupancy sensors; photo controls; relay panels; architectural dimming panels; and integrated lighting controls systems.
It also provides modular wiring products, light emitting diode drivers, glass products, and inverters; and services across applications that primarily relate to monitoring and controlling lighting systems through network technologies and the commissioning of control systems.
The company markets its products under the Lithonia Lighting, Holophane, Peerless, Gotham, Mark Architectural Lighting, Winona Lighting, Juno, Indy, Aculux, Healthcare Lighting, Hydrel, American Electric Lighting, Carandini, Antique Street Lamps, Sunoptics, RELOC Wiring Solutions, eldoLED, Distech Controls, Acuity Controls, and Atrius brand names.
It serves electrical distributors, retail home improvement centers, electric utilities, lighting showrooms, national accounts, government entities and municipalities, original equipment manufacturers, value-added resellers, utility distributors, system integrators, developers, and energy service companies, as well as new construction, renovation, and maintenance and repair markets.
The company sells its products through independent sales agents, electrical distributors, system integrators, and sales representatives, as well as through a network of distribution centers, regional warehouses, and commercial warehouses. Acuity Brands, Inc. was founded in 2001 and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. – Yahoo Finance
