AVA vs. NWE, ALE, UTL, CWT, MGEE, AWR, MYRG, PRMW, PAM, 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), MYR Group (MYRG), Primo Water (PRMW), Pampa Energía (PAM), and Chesapeake Utilities (CPK). These companies are all part of the "utilities" sector.
Avista (NYSE:AVA) and NorthWestern Energy Group (NYSE:NWE) are both mid-cap utilities companies, but which is the superior stock? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their community ranking, earnings, analyst recommendations, institutional ownership, profitability, valuation, media sentiment, dividends and risk.
Avista currently has a consensus target price of $33.50, suggesting a potential downside of 6.32%. NorthWestern Energy Group has a consensus target price of $51.71, suggesting a potential upside of 2.24%. Given NorthWestern Energy Group's stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe NorthWestern Energy Group is more favorable than Avista.
85.2% of Avista shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 96.1% of NorthWestern Energy Group shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.0% of Avista shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.6% of NorthWestern Energy Group shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.
Avista has a beta of 0.5, suggesting that its share price is 50% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, NorthWestern Energy Group has a beta of 0.43, suggesting that its share price is 57% less volatile than the S&P 500.
In the previous week, Avista had 2 more articles in the media than NorthWestern Energy Group. MarketBeat recorded 5 mentions for Avista and 3 mentions for NorthWestern Energy Group. NorthWestern Energy Group's average media sentiment score of 1.03 beat Avista's score of 0.70 indicating that NorthWestern Energy Group is being referred to more favorably in the news media.
NorthWestern Energy Group has a net margin of 13.64% compared to Avista's net margin of 9.77%. NorthWestern Energy Group's return on equity of 7.23% beat Avista's return on equity.
NorthWestern Energy Group has lower revenue, but higher earnings than Avista. NorthWestern Energy Group is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Avista, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Avista received 233 more outperform votes than NorthWestern Energy Group when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 48.06% of users gave Avista an outperform vote while only 13.33% of users gave NorthWestern Energy Group an outperform vote.
Avista pays an annual dividend of $1.90 per share and has a dividend yield of 5.3%. NorthWestern Energy Group pays an annual dividend of $2.60 per share and has a dividend yield of 5.1%. Avista pays out 85.2% 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 pays out 80.7% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future.
Summary
NorthWestern Energy Group beats Avista on 12 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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