AVA vs. NWE, ALE, UTL, CWT, MGEE, AWR, PAM, PRMW, MYRG, and CPK
Should you be buying Avista stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of Avista include NorthWestern Energy Group (NWE), ALLETE (ALE), Unitil (UTL), California Water Service Group (CWT), MGE Energy (MGEE), American States Water (AWR), Pampa Energía (PAM), Primo Water (PRMW), MYR Group (MYRG), and Chesapeake Utilities (CPK). These companies are all part of the "utilities" sector.
NorthWestern Energy Group (NYSE:NWE) and Avista (NYSE:AVA) are both mid-cap utilities companies, but which is the better investment? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their community ranking, profitability, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, risk, valuation, earnings, dividends and media sentiment.
96.1% of NorthWestern Energy Group shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 85.2% of Avista shares are held by institutional investors. 0.9% of NorthWestern Energy Group shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 1.0% of Avista shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.
NorthWestern Energy Group pays an annual dividend of $2.60 per share and has a dividend yield of 5.0%. Avista pays an annual dividend of $1.90 per share and has a dividend yield of 4.9%. NorthWestern Energy Group pays out 80.5% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. Avista pays out 78.8% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. NorthWestern Energy Group has raised its dividend for 20 consecutive years and Avista has raised its dividend for 22 consecutive years.
Avista received 233 more outperform votes than NorthWestern Energy Group when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 47.76% of users gave Avista an outperform vote while only 13.33% of users gave NorthWestern Energy Group an outperform vote.
NorthWestern Energy Group has higher earnings, but lower revenue than Avista. Avista is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than NorthWestern Energy Group, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
NorthWestern Energy Group has a beta of 0.43, indicating that its stock price is 57% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Avista has a beta of 0.48, indicating that its stock price is 52% less volatile than the S&P 500.
NorthWestern Energy Group has a net margin of 13.62% compared to NorthWestern Energy Group's net margin of 9.96%. NorthWestern Energy Group's return on equity of 7.65% beat Avista's return on equity.
In the previous week, Avista had 1 more articles in the media than NorthWestern Energy Group. MarketBeat recorded 6 mentions for Avista and 5 mentions for NorthWestern Energy Group. Avista's average media sentiment score of 0.89 beat NorthWestern Energy Group's score of 0.10 indicating that NorthWestern Energy Group is being referred to more favorably in the media.
NorthWestern Energy Group currently has a consensus target price of $51.71, indicating a potential downside of 0.11%. Avista has a consensus target price of $35.00, indicating a potential downside of 8.90%. Given Avista's higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe NorthWestern Energy Group is more favorable than Avista.
Summary
NorthWestern Energy Group beats Avista on 11 of the 20 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding AVA 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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