LUV vs. UAL, DAL, ALK, RYAAY, AAL, EXPD, WAB, ZTO, JBHT, and UHAL
Should you be buying Southwest Airlines stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of Southwest Airlines include United Airlines (UAL), Delta Air Lines (DAL), Alaska Air Group (ALK), Ryanair (RYAAY), American Airlines Group (AAL), Expeditors International of Washington (EXPD), Westinghouse Air Brake Technologies (WAB), ZTO Express (Cayman) (ZTO), J.B. Hunt Transport Services (JBHT), and U-Haul (UHAL). These companies are all part of the "transportation" sector.
Southwest Airlines vs.
United Airlines (NASDAQ:UAL) and Southwest Airlines (NYSE:LUV) are both large-cap transportation companies, but which is the superior business? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their media sentiment, earnings, analyst recommendations, community ranking, dividends, risk, institutional ownership, profitability and valuation.
United Airlines has a beta of 1.42, indicating that its share price is 42% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Southwest Airlines has a beta of 1.14, indicating that its share price is 14% more volatile than the S&P 500.
Southwest Airlines received 178 more outperform votes than United Airlines when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 71.88% of users gave Southwest Airlines an outperform vote while only 66.71% of users gave United Airlines an outperform vote.
United Airlines has higher revenue and earnings than Southwest Airlines. United Airlines is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Southwest Airlines, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
59.7% of United Airlines shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 74.7% of Southwest Airlines shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.4% of United Airlines shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 0.3% of Southwest Airlines shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.
United Airlines has a net margin of 3.93% compared to Southwest Airlines' net margin of 2.65%. United Airlines' return on equity of 35.71% beat Southwest Airlines' return on equity.
United Airlines currently has a consensus price target of $55.53, suggesting a potential upside of 17.51%. Southwest Airlines has a consensus price target of $44.71, suggesting a potential upside of 50.81%. Given Southwest Airlines' stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe Southwest Airlines is more favorable than United Airlines.
In the previous week, United Airlines had 16 more articles in the media than Southwest Airlines. MarketBeat recorded 23 mentions for United Airlines and 7 mentions for Southwest Airlines. United Airlines' average media sentiment score of 0.97 beat Southwest Airlines' score of 0.71 indicating that United Airlines is being referred to more favorably in the media.
Summary
United Airlines beats Southwest Airlines on 11 of the 19 factors compared between the two stocks.
New MarketBeat Followers Over Time
This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding LUV and its top 5 competitors to their watchlist. Each company is represented with a line over a 90 day period.
Skip ChartMedia Sentiment Over Time
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.
Skip Chart
Southwest Airlines Competitors List
Related Companies and Tools