UNH vs. ELV, JNJ, NVO, MRK, ABBV, AZN, TMO, NVS, ABT, and LLY
Should you be buying UnitedHealth Group stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of UnitedHealth Group include Elevance Health (ELV), Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), Novo Nordisk A/S (NVO), Merck & Co., Inc. (MRK), AbbVie (ABBV), AstraZeneca (AZN), Thermo Fisher Scientific (TMO), Novartis (NVS), Abbott Laboratories (ABT), and Eli Lilly and Company (LLY). These companies are all part of the "medical" sector.
Elevance Health (NYSE:ELV) and UnitedHealth Group (NYSE:UNH) are both large-cap medical companies, but which is the superior investment? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their community ranking, media sentiment, profitability, dividends, risk, earnings, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations and valuation.
UnitedHealth Group received 838 more outperform votes than Elevance Health when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 80.50% of users gave UnitedHealth Group an outperform vote while only 66.61% of users gave Elevance Health an outperform vote.
In the previous week, UnitedHealth Group had 39 more articles in the media than Elevance Health. MarketBeat recorded 47 mentions for UnitedHealth Group and 8 mentions for Elevance Health. UnitedHealth Group's average media sentiment score of 1.36 beat Elevance Health's score of 0.08 indicating that Elevance Health is being referred to more favorably in the media.
Elevance Health pays an annual dividend of $6.52 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.2%. UnitedHealth Group pays an annual dividend of $7.52 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.5%. Elevance Health pays out 24.6% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. UnitedHealth Group pays out 46.0% 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. Elevance Health has raised its dividend for 13 consecutive years and UnitedHealth Group has raised its dividend for 14 consecutive years. UnitedHealth Group is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.
UnitedHealth Group has higher revenue and earnings than Elevance Health. Elevance Health is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than UnitedHealth Group, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Elevance Health has a beta of 0.79, suggesting that its share price is 21% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, UnitedHealth Group has a beta of 0.55, suggesting that its share price is 45% less volatile than the S&P 500.
Elevance Health presently has a consensus price target of $587.42, suggesting a potential upside of 9.58%. UnitedHealth Group has a consensus price target of $570.05, suggesting a potential upside of 13.79%. Given Elevance Health's higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe UnitedHealth Group is more favorable than Elevance Health.
UnitedHealth Group has a net margin of 4.05% compared to UnitedHealth Group's net margin of 3.64%. Elevance Health's return on equity of 26.50% beat UnitedHealth Group's return on equity.
89.2% of Elevance Health shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 87.9% of UnitedHealth Group shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.3% of Elevance Health shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.4% of UnitedHealth Group shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.
Summary
UnitedHealth Group beats Elevance Health on 15 of the 21 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding UNH 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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