KAI vs. NDSN, WWD, LECO, ITT, DCI, RBC, CR, MIDD, MLI, and WTS
Should you be buying Kadant stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of Kadant include Nordson (NDSN), Woodward (WWD), Lincoln Electric (LECO), ITT (ITT), Donaldson (DCI), RBC Bearings (RBC), Crane (CR), Middleby (MIDD), Mueller Industries (MLI), and Watts Water Technologies (WTS). These companies are all part of the "industrial machinery" industry.
Nordson (NASDAQ:NDSN) and Kadant (NYSE:KAI) are both industrial products companies, but which is the better investment? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their valuation, earnings, risk, profitability, analyst recommendations, institutional ownership, community ranking, media sentiment and dividends.
Nordson pays an annual dividend of $2.72 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.2%. Kadant pays an annual dividend of $1.28 per share and has a dividend yield of 0.5%. Nordson pays out 32.4% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Kadant pays out 13.3% 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. Nordson has raised its dividend for 61 consecutive years and Kadant has raised its dividend for 11 consecutive years. Nordson is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.
Nordson has a net margin of 18.23% compared to Nordson's net margin of 11.53%. Kadant's return on equity of 20.20% beat Nordson's return on equity.
72.1% of Nordson shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 96.1% of Kadant shares are held by institutional investors. 0.9% of Nordson shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 1.4% of Kadant shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a company is poised for long-term growth.
Nordson has higher revenue and earnings than Kadant. Nordson is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Kadant, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Nordson has a beta of 0.93, meaning that its share price is 7% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Kadant has a beta of 1.25, meaning that its share price is 25% more volatile than the S&P 500.
Nordson presently has a consensus target price of $277.83, indicating a potential upside of 22.85%. Kadant has a consensus target price of $360.00, indicating a potential upside of 31.99%. Given Nordson's stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe Kadant is more favorable than Nordson.
In the previous week, Kadant had 3 more articles in the media than Nordson. MarketBeat recorded 10 mentions for Kadant and 7 mentions for Nordson. Kadant's average media sentiment score of 1.33 beat Nordson's score of 0.90 indicating that Nordson is being referred to more favorably in the media.
Nordson received 138 more outperform votes than Kadant when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 61.51% of users gave Nordson an outperform vote while only 57.91% of users gave Kadant an outperform vote.
Summary
Nordson beats Kadant on 12 of the 21 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding KAI 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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