BCPC vs. ASH, IOSP, HUN, OLN, FMC, HWKN, NGVT, ALTM, NEU, and VVV
Should you be buying Balchem stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of Balchem include Ashland (ASH), Innospec (IOSP), Huntsman (HUN), Olin (OLN), FMC (FMC), Hawkins (HWKN), Ingevity (NGVT), Arcadium Lithium (ALTM), NewMarket (NEU), and Valvoline (VVV). These companies are all part of the "basic materials" sector.
Balchem (NASDAQ:BCPC) and Ashland (NYSE:ASH) are both mid-cap basic materials companies, but which is the better stock? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their risk, media sentiment, community ranking, profitability, institutional ownership, dividends, earnings, analyst recommendations and valuation.
87.9% of Balchem shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 94.0% of Ashland shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.3% of Balchem shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 0.7% of Ashland shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.
Ashland received 204 more outperform votes than Balchem when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 68.76% of users gave Ashland an outperform vote while only 66.78% of users gave Balchem an outperform vote.
In the previous week, Ashland had 14 more articles in the media than Balchem. MarketBeat recorded 21 mentions for Ashland and 7 mentions for Balchem. Balchem's average media sentiment score of 1.25 beat Ashland's score of 0.05 indicating that Balchem is being referred to more favorably in the media.
Balchem presently has a consensus price target of $170.00, indicating a potential upside of 12.06%. Ashland has a consensus price target of $106.44, indicating a potential upside of 6.84%. Given Balchem's stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities research analysts plainly believe Balchem is more favorable than Ashland.
Balchem has a net margin of 12.35% compared to Ashland's net margin of 9.09%. Balchem's return on equity of 11.03% beat Ashland's return on equity.
Balchem pays an annual dividend of $0.40 per share and has a dividend yield of 0.3%. Ashland pays an annual dividend of $1.54 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.5%. Balchem pays out 11.3% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Ashland pays out 40.8% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Both companies have healthy payout ratios and should be able to cover their dividend payments with earnings for the next several years.
Ashland has higher revenue and earnings than Balchem. Ashland is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Balchem, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Balchem has a beta of 0.72, suggesting that its share price is 28% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Ashland has a beta of 0.92, suggesting that its share price is 8% less volatile than the S&P 500.
Summary
Balchem and Ashland tied by winning 10 of the 20 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding BCPC and its top 5 competitors to their watchlist. Each company is represented with a line over a 90 day period.
This chart shows the average media sentiment of NASDAQ and its competitors over the past 90 days as caculated by MarketBeat. The averaged score is equivalent to the following: Very Negative Sentiment <= -1.5, Negative Sentiment > -1.5 and <= -0.5, Neutral Sentiment > -0.5 and < 0.5, Positive Sentiment >= 0.5 and < 1.5, and Very Positive Sentiment >= 1.5.
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