AZN vs. NVS, NVO, SNY, GSK, TAK, ARGX, ONC, INSM, BNTX, and TEVA
Should you be buying AstraZeneca stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of AstraZeneca include Novartis (NVS), Novo Nordisk A/S (NVO), Sanofi (SNY), GSK (GSK), Takeda Pharmaceutical (TAK), argenex (ARGX), BeOne Medicines (ONC), Insmed (INSM), BioNTech (BNTX), and Teva Pharmaceutical Industries (TEVA). These companies are all part of the "pharmaceutical products" industry.
AstraZeneca vs. Its Competitors
AstraZeneca (NASDAQ:AZN) and Novartis (NYSE:NVS) are both large-cap medical companies, but which is the superior business? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, earnings, media sentiment, dividends, analyst recommendations, valuation, risk and profitability.
Novartis has lower revenue, but higher earnings than AstraZeneca. Novartis is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than AstraZeneca, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Novartis has a net margin of 25.64% compared to AstraZeneca's net margin of 14.68%. Novartis' return on equity of 41.08% beat AstraZeneca's return on equity.
AstraZeneca pays an annual dividend of $1.01 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.2%. Novartis pays an annual dividend of $2.60 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.0%. AstraZeneca pays out 38.0% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Novartis pays out 37.8% 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. Novartis is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.
In the previous week, Novartis had 1 more articles in the media than AstraZeneca. MarketBeat recorded 26 mentions for Novartis and 25 mentions for AstraZeneca. Novartis' average media sentiment score of 1.33 beat AstraZeneca's score of 1.25 indicating that Novartis is being referred to more favorably in the news media.
AstraZeneca currently has a consensus target price of $86.00, suggesting a potential upside of 4.74%. Novartis has a consensus target price of $123.50, suggesting a potential downside of 3.62%. Given AstraZeneca's stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe AstraZeneca is more favorable than Novartis.
AstraZeneca has a beta of 0.37, meaning that its share price is 63% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Novartis has a beta of 0.63, meaning that its share price is 37% less volatile than the S&P 500.
20.4% of AstraZeneca shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 13.1% of Novartis shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.0% of Novartis shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.
Summary
Novartis beats AstraZeneca on 13 of the 19 factors compared between the two stocks.
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New MarketBeat Followers Over Time
This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding AZN and its top 5 competitors to their watchlist. Each company is represented with a line over a 90 day period.
Skip ChartMedia Sentiment Over Time
This chart shows the average media sentiment of NASDAQ 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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This page (NASDAQ:AZN) was last updated on 9/4/2025 by MarketBeat.com Staff