APD vs. LIN, VALE, SCCO, FCX, RIO, ECL, NUE, DOW, DD, and NEM
Should you be buying Air Products and Chemicals stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of Air Products and Chemicals include Linde (LIN), Vale (VALE), Southern Copper (SCCO), Freeport-McMoRan (FCX), Rio Tinto Group (RIO), Ecolab (ECL), Nucor (NUE), DOW (DOW), DuPont de Nemours (DD), and Newmont (NEM). These companies are all part of the "basic materials" sector.
Linde (NYSE:LIN) and Air Products and Chemicals (NYSE:APD) are both large-cap basic materials companies, but which is the superior business? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their media sentiment, analyst recommendations, earnings, risk, profitability, institutional ownership, dividends, valuation and community ranking.
In the previous week, Air Products and Chemicals had 6 more articles in the media than Linde. MarketBeat recorded 14 mentions for Air Products and Chemicals and 8 mentions for Linde. Linde's average media sentiment score of 1.21 beat Air Products and Chemicals' score of 0.77 indicating that Air Products and Chemicals is being referred to more favorably in the news media.
Linde has a beta of 0.85, indicating that its stock price is 15% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Air Products and Chemicals has a beta of 0.87, indicating that its stock price is 13% less volatile than the S&P 500.
81.0% of Linde shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 82.6% of Air Products and Chemicals shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.7% of Linde shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.4% of Air Products and Chemicals shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.
Linde currently has a consensus price target of $404.41, suggesting a potential upside of 8.61%. Air Products and Chemicals has a consensus price target of $318.33, suggesting a potential upside of 12.33%. Given Linde's higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Air Products and Chemicals is more favorable than Linde.
Air Products and Chemicals received 268 more outperform votes than Linde when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 66.09% of users gave Air Products and Chemicals an outperform vote while only 64.38% of users gave Linde an outperform vote.
Linde has higher revenue and earnings than Air Products and Chemicals. Air Products and Chemicals is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Linde, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Linde pays an annual dividend of $5.10 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.4%. Air Products and Chemicals pays an annual dividend of $7.00 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.5%. Linde pays out 44.5% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Air Products and Chemicals pays out 71.2% 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. Linde has raised its dividend for 31 consecutive years and Air Products and Chemicals has raised its dividend for 42 consecutive years. Air Products and Chemicals is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.
Linde has a net margin of 17.20% compared to Linde's net margin of 16.88%. Linde's return on equity of 17.18% beat Air Products and Chemicals' return on equity.
Summary
Air Products and Chemicals beats Linde on 11 of the 21 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding APD and its top 5 competitors to their watchlist. Each company is represented with a line over a 90 day period.
Skip ChartThis 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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