MRK vs. JNJ, ABBV, PFE, BMY, LLY, AZN, NVS, ABT, SNY, and REGN
Should you be buying Merck & Co., Inc. stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of Merck & Co., Inc. include Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), AbbVie (ABBV), Pfizer (PFE), Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMY), Eli Lilly and Company (LLY), AstraZeneca (AZN), Novartis (NVS), Abbott Laboratories (ABT), Sanofi (SNY), and Regeneron Pharmaceuticals (REGN). These companies are all part of the "pharmaceutical preparations" industry.
Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ) and Merck & Co., Inc. (NYSE:MRK) are both large-cap medical companies, but which is the superior business? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their media sentiment, earnings, institutional ownership, profitability, community ranking, valuation, analyst recommendations, risk and dividends.
69.6% of Johnson & Johnson shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 76.1% of Merck & Co., Inc. shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.2% of Johnson & Johnson shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 0.1% of Merck & Co., Inc. shares are owned by 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.
Johnson & Johnson presently has a consensus target price of $175.86, indicating a potential upside of 18.06%. Merck & Co., Inc. has a consensus target price of $131.33, indicating a potential upside of 1.43%. Given Merck & Co., Inc.'s higher possible upside, research analysts clearly believe Johnson & Johnson is more favorable than Merck & Co., Inc..
Johnson & Johnson has a net margin of 45.26% compared to Johnson & Johnson's net margin of 3.76%. Merck & Co., Inc.'s return on equity of 36.70% beat Johnson & Johnson's return on equity.
Johnson & Johnson received 116 more outperform votes than Merck & Co., Inc. when rated by MarketBeat users. However, 66.97% of users gave Merck & Co., Inc. an outperform vote while only 64.93% of users gave Johnson & Johnson an outperform vote.
Johnson & Johnson has higher revenue and earnings than Merck & Co., Inc.. Johnson & Johnson is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Merck & Co., Inc., indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Johnson & Johnson pays an annual dividend of $4.96 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.3%. Merck & Co., Inc. pays an annual dividend of $3.08 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.4%. Johnson & Johnson pays out 30.9% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Merck & Co., Inc. pays out 342.2% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. Johnson & Johnson has raised its dividend for 63 consecutive years and Merck & Co., Inc. has raised its dividend for 13 consecutive years. Johnson & Johnson is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.
In the previous week, Johnson & Johnson had 27 more articles in the media than Merck & Co., Inc.. MarketBeat recorded 45 mentions for Johnson & Johnson and 18 mentions for Merck & Co., Inc.. Johnson & Johnson's average media sentiment score of 0.76 beat Merck & Co., Inc.'s score of 0.55 indicating that Merck & Co., Inc. is being referred to more favorably in the news media.
Johnson & Johnson has a beta of 0.55, indicating that its stock price is 45% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Merck & Co., Inc. has a beta of 0.39, indicating that its stock price is 61% less volatile than the S&P 500.
Summary
Johnson & Johnson beats Merck & Co., Inc. on 14 of the 21 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding MRK 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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