SO vs. EIX, NEE, ETR, FE, ES, PPL, AEP, D, VST, and DTE
Should you be buying Southern stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of Southern include Edison International (EIX), NextEra Energy (NEE), Entergy (ETR), FirstEnergy (FE), Eversource Energy (ES), PPL (PPL), American Electric Power (AEP), Dominion Energy (D), Vistra (VST), and DTE Energy (DTE). These companies are all part of the "electric services" industry.
Southern (NYSE:SO) and Edison International (NYSE:EIX) are both large-cap utilities companies, but which is the superior business? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, valuation, dividends, media sentiment, institutional ownership, profitability, community ranking, earnings and risk.
Edison International received 218 more outperform votes than Southern when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 63.19% of users gave Edison International an outperform vote while only 50.00% of users gave Southern an outperform vote.
Southern currently has a consensus target price of $74.71, indicating a potential downside of 3.61%. Edison International has a consensus target price of $72.78, indicating a potential downside of 1.45%. Given Edison International's higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe Edison International is more favorable than Southern.
Southern has a beta of 0.48, meaning that its share price is 52% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Edison International has a beta of 0.95, meaning that its share price is 5% less volatile than the S&P 500.
In the previous week, Southern had 20 more articles in the media than Edison International. MarketBeat recorded 30 mentions for Southern and 10 mentions for Edison International. Southern's average media sentiment score of 0.76 beat Edison International's score of 0.72 indicating that Southern is being referred to more favorably in the media.
Southern pays an annual dividend of $2.80 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.6%. Edison International pays an annual dividend of $3.12 per share and has a dividend yield of 4.2%. Southern pays out 72.4% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Edison International pays out 136.8% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future.
64.1% of Southern shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 88.9% of Edison International shares are held by institutional investors. 0.2% of Southern shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 1.2% of Edison International shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.
Southern has a net margin of 16.74% compared to Edison International's net margin of 6.14%. Edison International's return on equity of 12.48% beat Southern's return on equity.
Southern has higher revenue and earnings than Edison International. Southern is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Edison International, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Summary
Southern beats Edison International 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 SO 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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