WFG vs. CMC, OLN, HMY, AGI, ICL, ESI, CBT, ATI, CRS, and AXTA
Should you be buying West Fraser Timber stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of West Fraser Timber include Commercial Metals (CMC), Olin (OLN), Harmony Gold Mining (HMY), Alamos Gold (AGI), ICL Group (ICL), Element Solutions (ESI), Cabot (CBT), ATI (ATI), Carpenter Technology (CRS), and Axalta Coating Systems (AXTA). These companies are all part of the "basic materials" sector.
Commercial Metals (NYSE:CMC) and West Fraser Timber (NYSE:WFG) are both mid-cap basic materials companies, but which is the better stock? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their media sentiment, valuation, profitability, institutional ownership, earnings, community ranking, dividends, risk and analyst recommendations.
Commercial Metals presently has a consensus target price of $57.67, indicating a potential upside of 4.60%. West Fraser Timber has a consensus target price of $106.25, indicating a potential upside of 29.70%. Given Commercial Metals' stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe West Fraser Timber is more favorable than Commercial Metals.
Commercial Metals has a net margin of 8.09% compared to Commercial Metals' net margin of -1.39%. West Fraser Timber's return on equity of 17.72% beat Commercial Metals' return on equity.
Commercial Metals received 290 more outperform votes than West Fraser Timber when rated by MarketBeat users. However, 76.36% of users gave West Fraser Timber an outperform vote while only 54.25% of users gave Commercial Metals an outperform vote.
Commercial Metals pays an annual dividend of $0.72 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.3%. West Fraser Timber pays an annual dividend of $1.20 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.5%. Commercial Metals pays out 12.5% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. West Fraser Timber pays out -99.2% 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. Commercial Metals has increased its dividend for 4 consecutive years and West Fraser Timber has increased its dividend for 2 consecutive years. West Fraser Timber is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.
86.9% of Commercial Metals shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 40.2% of West Fraser Timber shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.0% of Commercial Metals shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 1.8% of West Fraser Timber shares are owned by company 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.
Commercial Metals has a beta of 1.35, indicating that its share price is 35% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, West Fraser Timber has a beta of 1.19, indicating that its share price is 19% more volatile than the S&P 500.
Commercial Metals has higher revenue and earnings than West Fraser Timber. West Fraser Timber is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Commercial Metals, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
In the previous week, Commercial Metals had 5 more articles in the media than West Fraser Timber. MarketBeat recorded 6 mentions for Commercial Metals and 1 mentions for West Fraser Timber. Commercial Metals' average media sentiment score of 1.84 beat West Fraser Timber's score of 1.37 indicating that West Fraser Timber is being referred to more favorably in the news media.
Summary
Commercial Metals beats West Fraser Timber on 12 of the 22 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding WFG 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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