NWN vs. NJR, NFG, SR, HE, KEN, VEON, SJW, TDS, IDT, and TAC
Should you be buying Northwest Natural stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of Northwest Natural include New Jersey Resources (NJR), National Fuel Gas (NFG), Spire (SR), Hawaiian Electric Industries (HE), Kenon (KEN), VEON (VEON), SJW Group (SJW), Telephone and Data Systems (TDS), IDT (IDT), and TransAlta (TAC). These companies are all part of the "utilities" sector.
New Jersey Resources (NYSE:NJR) and Northwest Natural (NYSE:NWN) are both utilities companies, but which is the better business? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their dividends, valuation, analyst recommendations, institutional ownership, media sentiment, community ranking, profitability, risk and earnings.
New Jersey Resources pays an annual dividend of $1.68 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.8%. Northwest Natural pays an annual dividend of $1.95 per share and has a dividend yield of 5.0%. New Jersey Resources pays out 68.9% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Northwest Natural pays out 75.0% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. New Jersey Resources has raised its dividend for 28 consecutive years and Northwest Natural has raised its dividend for 69 consecutive years. Northwest Natural is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.
In the previous week, New Jersey Resources had 6 more articles in the media than Northwest Natural. MarketBeat recorded 9 mentions for New Jersey Resources and 3 mentions for Northwest Natural. New Jersey Resources' average media sentiment score of 0.98 beat Northwest Natural's score of 0.47 indicating that Northwest Natural is being referred to more favorably in the news media.
New Jersey Resources has a beta of 0.62, indicating that its share price is 38% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Northwest Natural has a beta of 0.54, indicating that its share price is 46% less volatile than the S&P 500.
71.0% of New Jersey Resources shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 75.1% of Northwest Natural shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.8% of New Jersey Resources shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.8% of Northwest Natural shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.
New Jersey Resources currently has a consensus price target of $45.00, suggesting a potential upside of 0.67%. Northwest Natural has a consensus price target of $45.20, suggesting a potential upside of 16.95%. Given New Jersey Resources' higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Northwest Natural is more favorable than New Jersey Resources.
New Jersey Resources has higher revenue and earnings than Northwest Natural. Northwest Natural is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than New Jersey Resources, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
New Jersey Resources has a net margin of 13.96% compared to New Jersey Resources' net margin of 7.84%. Northwest Natural's return on equity of 11.13% beat New Jersey Resources' return on equity.
New Jersey Resources received 49 more outperform votes than Northwest Natural when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 57.22% of users gave New Jersey Resources an outperform vote while only 52.41% of users gave Northwest Natural an outperform vote.
Summary
New Jersey Resources beats Northwest Natural on 12 of the 19 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding NWN 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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