UTL vs. GNE, AVA, NWE, MSEX, EDN, SHEN, IDT, CLNE, YORW, and CNSL
Should you be buying Unitil stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of Unitil include Genie Energy (GNE), Avista (AVA), NorthWestern Energy Group (NWE), Middlesex Water (MSEX), Empresa Distribuidora y Comercializadora Norte Sociedad Anónima (EDN), Shenandoah Telecommunications (SHEN), IDT (IDT), Clean Energy Fuels (CLNE), York Water (YORW), and Consolidated Communications (CNSL). These companies are all part of the "utilities" sector.
Genie Energy (NYSE:GNE) and Unitil (NYSE:UTL) are both small-cap utilities companies, but which is the superior investment? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their dividends, media sentiment, valuation, community ranking, earnings, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, risk and profitability.
Unitil received 153 more outperform votes than Genie Energy when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 61.79% of users gave Unitil an outperform vote while only 57.10% of users gave Genie Energy an outperform vote.
49.2% of Genie Energy shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 76.8% of Unitil shares are owned by institutional investors. 16.5% of Genie Energy shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 1.9% of Unitil shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.
Unitil has higher revenue and earnings than Genie Energy. Unitil is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Genie Energy, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Unitil has a net margin of 8.11% compared to Unitil's net margin of 4.56%. Unitil's return on equity of 25.39% beat Genie Energy's return on equity.
Genie Energy has a beta of 0.17, suggesting that its share price is 83% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Unitil has a beta of 0.58, suggesting that its share price is 42% less volatile than the S&P 500.
Unitil has a consensus price target of $51.00, suggesting a potential upside of 1.21%. Given Genie Energy's higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Unitil is more favorable than Genie Energy.
In the previous week, Unitil had 2 more articles in the media than Genie Energy. MarketBeat recorded 4 mentions for Unitil and 2 mentions for Genie Energy. Unitil's average media sentiment score of 0.97 beat Genie Energy's score of 0.25 indicating that Genie Energy is being referred to more favorably in the media.
Genie Energy pays an annual dividend of $0.30 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.9%. Unitil pays an annual dividend of $1.70 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.4%. Genie Energy pays out 40.5% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Unitil pays out 60.3% 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. Unitil has raised its dividend for 10 consecutive years. Unitil is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.
Summary
Unitil beats Genie Energy on 13 of the 19 factors compared between the two stocks.
Get Unitil News Delivered to You Automatically
Sign up to receive the latest news and ratings for UTL and its competitors with MarketBeat's FREE daily newsletter.
This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding UTL 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.
Related Companies and Tools
