FULT vs. SFNC, CBU, FFBC, FRME, BANF, TBBK, WSBC, NBTB, TRMK, and CHCO
Should you be buying Fulton Financial stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of Fulton Financial include Simmons First National (SFNC), Community Bank System (CBU), First Financial Bancorp. (FFBC), First Merchants (FRME), BancFirst (BANF), Bancorp (TBBK), WesBanco (WSBC), NBT Bancorp (NBTB), Trustmark (TRMK), and City (CHCO). These companies are all part of the "regional banks" industry.
Simmons First National (NASDAQ:SFNC) and Fulton Financial (NASDAQ:FULT) are both mid-cap finance companies, but which is the superior stock? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their dividends, risk, institutional ownership, media sentiment, earnings, analyst recommendations, community ranking, valuation and profitability.
Simmons First National and Fulton Financial both received 269 outperform votes by MarketBeat users. However, 48.47% of users gave Simmons First National an outperform vote while only 46.14% of users gave Fulton Financial an outperform vote.
Simmons First National currently has a consensus price target of $21.00, suggesting a potential upside of 20.00%. Fulton Financial has a consensus price target of $16.17, suggesting a potential upside of 3.50%. Given Fulton Financial's higher probable upside, research analysts clearly believe Simmons First National is more favorable than Fulton Financial.
Fulton Financial has a net margin of 18.31% compared to Fulton Financial's net margin of 11.97%. Simmons First National's return on equity of 11.50% beat Fulton Financial's return on equity.
27.6% of Simmons First National shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 72.0% of Fulton Financial shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.9% of Simmons First National shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 1.1% of Fulton Financial shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.
Fulton Financial has higher revenue and earnings than Simmons First National. Fulton Financial is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Simmons First National, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Simmons First National has a beta of 0.87, suggesting that its share price is 13% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Fulton Financial has a beta of 0.81, suggesting that its share price is 19% less volatile than the S&P 500.
In the previous week, Simmons First National had 8 more articles in the media than Fulton Financial. MarketBeat recorded 25 mentions for Simmons First National and 17 mentions for Fulton Financial. Fulton Financial's average media sentiment score of 0.45 beat Simmons First National's score of 0.41 indicating that Simmons First National is being referred to more favorably in the media.
Simmons First National pays an annual dividend of $0.84 per share and has a dividend yield of 4.8%. Fulton Financial pays an annual dividend of $0.68 per share and has a dividend yield of 4.4%. Simmons First National pays out 63.2% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Fulton Financial pays out 42.2% 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. Simmons First National has increased its dividend for 13 consecutive years and Fulton Financial has increased its dividend for 3 consecutive years. Simmons First National is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.
Summary
Simmons First National beats Fulton Financial on 10 of the 18 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding FULT and its top 5 competitors to their watchlist. Each company is represented with a line over a 90 day period.
Skip ChartThis chart shows the average media sentiment of NASDAQ 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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