GPK vs. SON, PKG, MIDD, AGCO, DCI, SITE, AIT, MSA, RBC, and BERY
Should you be buying Graphic Packaging stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of Graphic Packaging include Sonoco Products (SON), Packaging Co. of America (PKG), Middleby (MIDD), AGCO (AGCO), Donaldson (DCI), SiteOne Landscape Supply (SITE), Applied Industrial Technologies (AIT), MSA Safety (MSA), RBC Bearings (RBC), and Berry Global Group (BERY). These companies are all part of the "industrial products" sector.
Sonoco Products (NYSE:SON) and Graphic Packaging (NYSE:GPK) are both mid-cap industrial products companies, but which is the better investment? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, community ranking, profitability, earnings, valuation, risk, media sentiment, dividends and analyst recommendations.
Graphic Packaging has higher revenue and earnings than Sonoco Products. Graphic Packaging is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Sonoco Products, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
77.7% of Sonoco Products shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 99.7% of Graphic Packaging shares are held by institutional investors. 0.5% of Sonoco Products shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 1.2% of Graphic Packaging shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.
Sonoco Products pays an annual dividend of $2.04 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.6%. Graphic Packaging pays an annual dividend of $0.40 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.5%. Sonoco Products pays out 51.5% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Graphic Packaging pays out 18.1% 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. Sonoco Products has increased its dividend for 2 consecutive years. Sonoco Products is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.
Sonoco Products received 160 more outperform votes than Graphic Packaging when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 64.24% of users gave Sonoco Products an outperform vote while only 64.08% of users gave Graphic Packaging an outperform vote.
Graphic Packaging has a net margin of 7.36% compared to Graphic Packaging's net margin of 5.86%. Sonoco Products' return on equity of 32.55% beat Graphic Packaging's return on equity.
Sonoco Products currently has a consensus price target of $63.33, suggesting a potential upside of 11.50%. Graphic Packaging has a consensus price target of $28.13, suggesting a potential upside of 3.82%. Given Graphic Packaging's higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Sonoco Products is more favorable than Graphic Packaging.
In the previous week, Graphic Packaging had 11 more articles in the media than Sonoco Products. MarketBeat recorded 25 mentions for Graphic Packaging and 14 mentions for Sonoco Products. Graphic Packaging's average media sentiment score of 0.67 beat Sonoco Products' score of 0.44 indicating that Sonoco Products is being referred to more favorably in the media.
Sonoco Products has a beta of 0.68, suggesting that its stock price is 32% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Graphic Packaging has a beta of 0.86, suggesting that its stock price is 14% less volatile than the S&P 500.
Summary
Graphic Packaging beats Sonoco Products on 13 of the 21 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding GPK 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 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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