MDU vs. NFG, IDA, SWX, UGI, POR, NJR, AQN, ENIC, BEP, and BIPC
Should you be buying MDU Resources Group stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of MDU Resources Group include National Fuel Gas (NFG), IDACORP (IDA), Southwest Gas (SWX), UGI (UGI), Portland General Electric (POR), New Jersey Resources (NJR), Algonquin Power & Utilities (AQN), Enel Chile (ENIC), Brookfield Renewable Partners (BEP), and Brookfield Infrastructure (BIPC). These companies are all part of the "utilities" sector.
MDU Resources Group (NYSE:MDU) and National Fuel Gas (NYSE:NFG) are both mid-cap utilities companies, but which is the superior business? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their community ranking, risk, profitability, dividends, institutional ownership, valuation, analyst recommendations, earnings and media sentiment.
National Fuel Gas has a consensus target price of $61.25, indicating a potential upside of 9.71%. Given National Fuel Gas' higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe National Fuel Gas is more favorable than MDU Resources Group.
National Fuel Gas has lower revenue, but higher earnings than MDU Resources Group. MDU Resources Group is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than National Fuel Gas, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
MDU Resources Group has a beta of 0.78, indicating that its share price is 22% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, National Fuel Gas has a beta of 0.63, indicating that its share price is 37% less volatile than the S&P 500.
National Fuel Gas has a net margin of 23.84% compared to MDU Resources Group's net margin of 10.74%. National Fuel Gas' return on equity of 15.06% beat MDU Resources Group's return on equity.
In the previous week, National Fuel Gas had 3 more articles in the media than MDU Resources Group. MarketBeat recorded 13 mentions for National Fuel Gas and 10 mentions for MDU Resources Group. National Fuel Gas' average media sentiment score of 0.59 beat MDU Resources Group's score of 0.19 indicating that National Fuel Gas is being referred to more favorably in the news media.
National Fuel Gas received 177 more outperform votes than MDU Resources Group when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 65.78% of users gave National Fuel Gas an outperform vote while only 61.70% of users gave MDU Resources Group an outperform vote.
71.4% of MDU Resources Group shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 74.0% of National Fuel Gas shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.6% of MDU Resources Group shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 1.6% of National Fuel Gas shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.
MDU Resources Group pays an annual dividend of $0.50 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.0%. National Fuel Gas pays an annual dividend of $1.98 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.5%. MDU Resources Group pays out 21.4% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. National Fuel Gas pays out 39.3% 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.
Summary
National Fuel Gas beats MDU Resources Group on 15 of the 18 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding MDU 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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