STE vs. BAX, ILMN, BNTX, PHG, MOH, GMAB, WAT, ARGX, ALNY, and COO
Should you be buying STERIS stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of STERIS include Baxter International (BAX), Illumina (ILMN), BioNTech (BNTX), Koninklijke Philips (PHG), Molina Healthcare (MOH), Genmab A/S (GMAB), Waters (WAT), argenx (ARGX), Alnylam Pharmaceuticals (ALNY), and Cooper Companies (COO). These companies are all part of the "medical" sector.
STERIS (NYSE:STE) and Baxter International (NYSE:BAX) are both large-cap medical companies, but which is the superior stock? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their media sentiment, institutional ownership, profitability, dividends, valuation, earnings, community ranking, risk and analyst recommendations.
Baxter International has higher revenue and earnings than STERIS. Baxter International is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than STERIS, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Baxter International has a net margin of 17.77% compared to STERIS's net margin of 10.48%. Baxter International's return on equity of 19.49% beat STERIS's return on equity.
STERIS pays an annual dividend of $2.08 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.0%. Baxter International pays an annual dividend of $1.16 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.9%. STERIS pays out 36.4% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Baxter International pays out 22.2% 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. Baxter International is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.
In the previous week, Baxter International had 2 more articles in the media than STERIS. MarketBeat recorded 11 mentions for Baxter International and 9 mentions for STERIS. STERIS's average media sentiment score of 0.75 beat Baxter International's score of 0.42 indicating that STERIS is being referred to more favorably in the media.
Baxter International received 407 more outperform votes than STERIS when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 66.30% of users gave Baxter International an outperform vote while only 58.68% of users gave STERIS an outperform vote.
94.7% of STERIS shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 90.2% of Baxter International shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.0% of STERIS shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.2% of Baxter International shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.
STERIS has a beta of 0.79, indicating that its stock price is 21% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Baxter International has a beta of 0.62, indicating that its stock price is 38% less volatile than the S&P 500.
STERIS presently has a consensus target price of $239.60, suggesting a potential upside of 17.51%. Baxter International has a consensus target price of $46.30, suggesting a potential upside of 15.33%. Given STERIS's stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe STERIS is more favorable than Baxter International.
Summary
STERIS beats Baxter International on 11 of the 20 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding STE 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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