LH vs. DGX, NTRA, EXAS, AVTR, HOLX, ILMN, BMRN, TEVA, BAX, and COO
Should you be buying Laboratory Co. of America stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of Laboratory Co. of America include Quest Diagnostics (DGX), Natera (NTRA), Exact Sciences (EXAS), Avantor (AVTR), Hologic (HOLX), Illumina (ILMN), BioMarin Pharmaceutical (BMRN), Teva Pharmaceutical Industries (TEVA), Baxter International (BAX), and Cooper Companies (COO). These companies are all part of the "medical" sector.
Laboratory Co. of America (NYSE:LH) and Quest Diagnostics (NYSE:DGX) are both large-cap medical companies, but which is the superior business? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their community ranking, risk, profitability, dividends, institutional ownership, valuation, analyst recommendations, earnings and media sentiment.
Laboratory Co. of America presently has a consensus target price of $243.14, indicating a potential upside of 15.68%. Quest Diagnostics has a consensus target price of $146.17, indicating a potential upside of 3.50%. Given Laboratory Co. of America's stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, equities research analysts clearly believe Laboratory Co. of America is more favorable than Quest Diagnostics.
95.9% of Laboratory Co. of America shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 88.1% of Quest Diagnostics shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.9% of Laboratory Co. of America shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.8% of Quest Diagnostics 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.
Laboratory Co. of America received 79 more outperform votes than Quest Diagnostics when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 64.10% of users gave Laboratory Co. of America an outperform vote while only 49.48% of users gave Quest Diagnostics an outperform vote.
Laboratory Co. of America pays an annual dividend of $2.88 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.4%. Quest Diagnostics pays an annual dividend of $2.84 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.0%. Laboratory Co. of America pays out 57.9% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Quest Diagnostics pays out 38.2% 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. Quest Diagnostics is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.
In the previous week, Laboratory Co. of America had 6 more articles in the media than Quest Diagnostics. MarketBeat recorded 16 mentions for Laboratory Co. of America and 10 mentions for Quest Diagnostics. Laboratory Co. of America's average media sentiment score of 0.99 beat Quest Diagnostics' score of 0.66 indicating that Laboratory Co. of America is being referred to more favorably in the media.
Quest Diagnostics has a net margin of 9.11% compared to Laboratory Co. of America's net margin of 3.52%. Quest Diagnostics' return on equity of 15.52% beat Laboratory Co. of America's return on equity.
Quest Diagnostics has lower revenue, but higher earnings than Laboratory Co. of America. Quest Diagnostics is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Laboratory Co. of America, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Laboratory Co. of America has a beta of 1.02, indicating that its share price is 2% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Quest Diagnostics has a beta of 0.88, indicating that its share price is 12% less volatile than the S&P 500.
Summary
Laboratory Co. of America beats Quest Diagnostics on 12 of the 20 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding LH 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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