NI vs. CMS, AEE, WEC, ED, PEG, PCG, LNT, EVRG, ALE, and XEL
Should you be buying NiSource stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of NiSource include CMS Energy (CMS), Ameren (AEE), WEC Energy Group (WEC), Consolidated Edison (ED), Public Service Enterprise Group (PEG), PG&E (PCG), Alliant Energy (LNT), Evergy (EVRG), ALLETE (ALE), and Xcel Energy (XEL). These companies are all part of the "electric & other services combined" industry.
CMS Energy (NYSE:CMS) and NiSource (NYSE:NI) are both large-cap utilities companies, but which is the superior investment? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their community ranking, valuation, institutional ownership, dividends, earnings, profitability, media sentiment, analyst recommendations and risk.
CMS Energy has higher revenue and earnings than NiSource. NiSource is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than CMS Energy, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
93.6% of CMS Energy shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 91.6% of NiSource shares are held by institutional investors. 0.5% of CMS Energy shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 0.1% of NiSource shares are held by 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.
CMS Energy pays an annual dividend of $2.06 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.4%. NiSource pays an annual dividend of $1.06 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.8%. CMS Energy pays out 68.4% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. NiSource pays out 72.1% 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. CMS Energy has increased its dividend for 2 consecutive years and NiSource has increased its dividend for 13 consecutive years. NiSource is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.
CMS Energy received 131 more outperform votes than NiSource when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 62.60% of users gave CMS Energy an outperform vote while only 53.92% of users gave NiSource an outperform vote.
NiSource has a net margin of 12.98% compared to NiSource's net margin of 11.89%. NiSource's return on equity of 12.09% beat CMS Energy's return on equity.
CMS Energy currently has a consensus price target of $63.00, suggesting a potential upside of 4.51%. NiSource has a consensus price target of $29.00, suggesting a potential upside of 2.89%. Given NiSource's higher possible upside, equities research analysts clearly believe CMS Energy is more favorable than NiSource.
In the previous week, CMS Energy had 17 more articles in the media than NiSource. MarketBeat recorded 21 mentions for CMS Energy and 4 mentions for NiSource. CMS Energy's average media sentiment score of 1.04 beat NiSource's score of 0.86 indicating that NiSource is being referred to more favorably in the news media.
CMS Energy has a beta of 0.38, indicating that its share price is 62% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, NiSource has a beta of 0.49, indicating that its share price is 51% less volatile than the S&P 500.
Summary
CMS Energy beats NiSource on 15 of the 21 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding NI 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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