Darling Ingredients (DAR) Competitors

Darling Ingredients (NYSE:DAR) and MEDIFAST (NYSE:MED) are both consumer staples companies, but which is the superior business? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their profitability, institutional ownership, earnings, valuation, media sentiment, dividends, analyst recommendations and risk.

Is DAR or MED more profitable?

Darling Ingredients has a net margin of 1.85% compared to MEDIFAST's net margin of 0.76%. Darling Ingredients' return on equity of 2.35% beat MEDIFAST's return on equity.

Company	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Darling Ingredients	1.85%	2.35%	1.05%
MEDIFAST	0.76%	2.00%	1.50%

Do institutionals and insiders believe in DAR or MED?

94.4% of Darling Ingredients shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 95.5% of MEDIFAST shares are held by institutional investors. 2.6% of Darling Ingredients shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 2.9% of MEDIFAST shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Do analysts rate DAR or MED?

Darling Ingredients currently has a consensus target price of $43.57, indicating a potential upside of 25.28%. MEDIFAST has a consensus target price of $16.50, indicating a potential upside of 15.56%. Given Darling Ingredients' stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, equities research analysts clearly believe Darling Ingredients is more favorable than MEDIFAST.

Company	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Darling Ingredients	0 Sell rating(s)	3 Hold rating(s)	5 Buy rating(s)	1 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.78
MEDIFAST	0 Sell rating(s)	1 Hold rating(s)	0 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.00

Which has stronger valuation & earnings, DAR or MED?

Darling Ingredients has higher revenue and earnings than MEDIFAST. MEDIFAST is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Darling Ingredients, 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
Darling Ingredients	$5.72B	0.96	$278.88M	$0.66	52.69
MEDIFAST	$602.46M	0.26	$2.09M	$0.32	44.62

Does the media refer more to DAR or MED?

In the previous week, Darling Ingredients had 27 more articles in the media than MEDIFAST. MarketBeat recorded 27 mentions for Darling Ingredients and 0 mentions for MEDIFAST. Darling Ingredients' average media sentiment score of 1.30 beat MEDIFAST's score of 0.50 indicating that Darling Ingredients is being referred to more favorably in the media.

Company	Overall Sentiment
Darling Ingredients	Positive
MEDIFAST	Positive

Which has more volatility & risk, DAR or MED?

Darling Ingredients has a beta of 1.19, suggesting that its share price is 19% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, MEDIFAST has a beta of 0.8, suggesting that its share price is 20% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Darling Ingredients beats MEDIFAST on 14 of the 17 factors compared between the two stocks.