DGX vs. LH, NTRA, EXAS, RDNT, BGNE, BMRN, NBIX, AVTR, VTRS, and HOLX
Should you be buying Quest Diagnostics stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of Quest Diagnostics include Laboratory Co. of America (LH), Natera (NTRA), Exact Sciences (EXAS), RadNet (RDNT), BeiGene (BGNE), BioMarin Pharmaceutical (BMRN), Neurocrine Biosciences (NBIX), Avantor (AVTR), Viatris (VTRS), and Hologic (HOLX). These companies are all part of the "medical" sector.
Laboratory Co. of America (NYSE:LH) and Quest Diagnostics (NYSE:DGX) are both large-cap medical companies, but which is the superior stock? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their earnings, analyst recommendations, community ranking, profitability, institutional ownership, valuation, risk, dividends and media sentiment.
Quest Diagnostics has a net margin of 9.11% compared to Quest Diagnostics' net margin of 3.52%. Laboratory Co. of America's return on equity of 15.52% beat Quest Diagnostics' return on equity.
Laboratory Co. of America received 79 more outperform votes than Quest Diagnostics when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 64.10% of users gave Laboratory Co. of America an outperform vote while only 49.48% of users gave Quest Diagnostics an outperform vote.
Laboratory Co. of America has a beta of 1.02, suggesting that its stock price is 2% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Quest Diagnostics has a beta of 0.88, suggesting that its stock price is 12% less volatile than the S&P 500.
95.9% of Laboratory Co. of America shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 88.1% of Quest Diagnostics shares are held by institutional investors. 0.9% of Laboratory Co. of America shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 0.8% of Quest Diagnostics shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.
Laboratory Co. of America presently has a consensus target price of $243.14, suggesting a potential upside of 15.46%. Quest Diagnostics has a consensus target price of $146.17, suggesting a potential upside of 1.27%. Given Quest Diagnostics' stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities analysts plainly believe Laboratory Co. of America is more favorable than Quest Diagnostics.
Quest Diagnostics has lower revenue, but higher earnings than Laboratory Co. of America. Quest Diagnostics is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Laboratory Co. of America, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Laboratory Co. of America pays an annual dividend of $2.88 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.4%. Quest Diagnostics pays an annual dividend of $2.84 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.0%. Laboratory Co. of America pays out 57.9% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Quest Diagnostics pays out 38.2% 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. Quest Diagnostics has raised its dividend for 13 consecutive years. Quest Diagnostics is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.
In the previous week, Quest Diagnostics had 17 more articles in the media than Laboratory Co. of America. MarketBeat recorded 32 mentions for Quest Diagnostics and 15 mentions for Laboratory Co. of America. Quest Diagnostics' average media sentiment score of 0.94 beat Laboratory Co. of America's score of 0.46 indicating that Laboratory Co. of America is being referred to more favorably in the media.
Summary
Laboratory Co. of America beats Quest Diagnostics on 11 of the 21 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding DGX 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 NYSE 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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