Dollar General (DG) Competitors

Dollar General (NYSE:DG) and Target (NYSE:TGT) are both large-cap retail/wholesale companies, but which is the superior business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, media sentiment, earnings, risk, profitability, community ranking, dividends, valuation and analyst recommendations.

Does the MarketBeat Community prefer DG or TGT?

Target received 6287 more outperform votes than Dollar General when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 89.24% of users gave Target an outperform vote while only 66.76% of users gave Dollar General an outperform vote.

Company	Underperform	Outperform
Dollar General	Outperform Votes 1219 66.76%	Underperform Votes 607 33.24%
Target	Outperform Votes 7506 89.24%	Underperform Votes 905 10.76%

Do analysts rate DG or TGT?

Dollar General currently has a consensus price target of $109.04, indicating a potential downside of 1.87%. Target has a consensus price target of $116.70, indicating a potential upside of 15.87%. Given Target's higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Target is more favorable than Dollar General.

Company	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Dollar General	0 Sell rating(s)	15 Hold rating(s)	12 Buy rating(s)	1 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.50
Target	1 Sell rating(s)	24 Hold rating(s)	9 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.24

Do institutionals & insiders hold more shares of DG or TGT?

91.8% of Dollar General shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 79.7% of Target shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.6% of Dollar General shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.2% of Target shares are owned 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.

Which has stronger valuation and earnings, DG or TGT?

Target has higher revenue and earnings than Dollar General. Target is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Dollar General, 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
Dollar General	$41.13B	0.59	$1.66B	$5.24	21.20
Target	$105.88B	0.43	$4.14B	$9.10	11.07

Is DG or TGT more profitable?

Target has a net margin of 4.06% compared to Dollar General's net margin of 3.33%. Target's return on equity of 31.11% beat Dollar General's return on equity.

Company	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Dollar General	3.33%	18.85%	4.27%
Target	4.06%	31.11%	7.77%

Is DG or TGT a better dividend stock?

Dollar General pays an annual dividend of $2.36 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.1%. Target pays an annual dividend of $4.48 per share and has a dividend yield of 4.4%. Dollar General pays out 45.0% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Target pays out 49.2% 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. Target has increased its dividend for 54 consecutive years. Target is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.

Does the media prefer DG or TGT?

In the previous week, Dollar General had 87 more articles in the media than Target. MarketBeat recorded 99 mentions for Dollar General and 12 mentions for Target. Dollar General's average media sentiment score of 0.82 beat Target's score of 0.35 indicating that Dollar General is being referred to more favorably in the media.

Company	Very Positive	Positive	Neutral	Negative	Very Negative	Overall Sentiment
Dollar General	35 Very Positive mention(s)	15 Positive mention(s)	25 Neutral mention(s)	0 Negative mention(s)	2 Very Negative mention(s)	Positive
Target	4 Very Positive mention(s)	0 Positive mention(s)	2 Neutral mention(s)	2 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Neutral

Which has more risk & volatility, DG or TGT?

Dollar General has a beta of 0.26, indicating that its stock price is 74% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Target has a beta of 1.22, indicating that its stock price is 22% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Target beats Dollar General on 12 of the 22 factors compared between the two stocks.