Cardinal Health (CAH) Competitors

Cardinal Health (NYSE:CAH) and McKesson (NYSE:MCK) are both large-cap medical companies, but which is the superior stock? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their risk, community ranking, dividends, institutional ownership, valuation, analyst recommendations, media sentiment, profitability and earnings.

Does the MarketBeat Community prefer CAH or MCK?

McKesson received 50 more outperform votes than Cardinal Health when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 74.22% of users gave McKesson an outperform vote while only 71.51% of users gave Cardinal Health an outperform vote.

Company	Underperform	Outperform
Cardinal Health	Outperform Votes 926 71.51%	Underperform Votes 369 28.49%
McKesson	Outperform Votes 976 74.22%	Underperform Votes 339 25.78%

Do analysts rate CAH or MCK?

Cardinal Health presently has a consensus price target of $144.71, suggesting a potential downside of 3.26%. McKesson has a consensus price target of $681.00, suggesting a potential downside of 3.54%. Given Cardinal Health's higher possible upside, research analysts clearly believe Cardinal Health is more favorable than McKesson.

Company	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Cardinal Health	0 Sell rating(s)	4 Hold rating(s)	10 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.71
McKesson	0 Sell rating(s)	3 Hold rating(s)	12 Buy rating(s)	1 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.88

Is CAH or MCK more profitable?

McKesson has a net margin of 0.82% compared to Cardinal Health's net margin of 0.59%. Cardinal Health's return on equity of -59.57% beat McKesson's return on equity.

Company	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Cardinal Health	0.59%	-59.57%	4.17%
McKesson	0.82%	-181.26%	5.34%

Do insiders & institutionals hold more shares of CAH or MCK?

87.2% of Cardinal Health shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 85.1% of McKesson shares are held by institutional investors. 0.1% of Cardinal Health shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.1% of McKesson shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Is CAH or MCK a better dividend stock?

Cardinal Health pays an annual dividend of $2.02 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.4%. McKesson pays an annual dividend of $2.84 per share and has a dividend yield of 0.4%. Cardinal Health pays out 37.7% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. McKesson pays out 13.0% 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. Cardinal Health has increased its dividend for 28 consecutive years and McKesson has increased its dividend for 17 consecutive years. Cardinal Health is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.

Does the media favor CAH or MCK?

In the previous week, Cardinal Health had 6 more articles in the media than McKesson. MarketBeat recorded 39 mentions for Cardinal Health and 33 mentions for McKesson. McKesson's average media sentiment score of 1.18 beat Cardinal Health's score of 0.99 indicating that McKesson is being referred to more favorably in the news media.

Company	Very Positive	Positive	Neutral	Negative	Very Negative	Overall Sentiment
Cardinal Health	22 Very Positive mention(s)	1 Positive mention(s)	10 Neutral mention(s)	1 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Positive
McKesson	25 Very Positive mention(s)	1 Positive mention(s)	5 Neutral mention(s)	0 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Positive

Which has better earnings & valuation, CAH or MCK?

McKesson has higher revenue and earnings than Cardinal Health. Cardinal Health is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than McKesson, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Company	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Cardinal Health	$222.28B	0.16	$852M	$5.36	27.91
McKesson	$344.58B	0.26	$3.00B	$21.84	32.32

Which has more risk & volatility, CAH or MCK?

Cardinal Health has a beta of 0.61, suggesting that its share price is 39% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, McKesson has a beta of 0.49, suggesting that its share price is 51% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

McKesson beats Cardinal Health on 15 of the 22 factors compared between the two stocks.