ACO.X vs. CU, ACO.Y, JE, BIP.UN, EMA, BEP.UN, BEPC, BIPC, NPI, and AQN
Should you be buying ATCO stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of ATCO include Canadian Utilities (CU), ATCO (ACO.Y), Just Energy Group (JE), Brookfield Infrastructure Partners (BIP.UN), Emera (EMA), Brookfield Renewable Partners (BEP.UN), Brookfield Renewable (BEPC), Brookfield Infrastructure (BIPC), Northland Power (NPI), and Algonquin Power & Utilities (AQN). These companies are all part of the "utilities" sector.
Canadian Utilities (TSE:CU) and ATCO (TSE:ACO.X) are both mid-cap utilities companies, but which is the superior investment? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their profitability, community ranking, dividends, institutional ownership, valuation, earnings, risk, analyst recommendations and media sentiment.
Canadian Utilities has a net margin of 17.49% compared to Canadian Utilities' net margin of 8.75%. ATCO's return on equity of 9.25% beat Canadian Utilities' return on equity.
Canadian Utilities currently has a consensus target price of C$35.43, suggesting a potential upside of 13.99%. ATCO has a consensus target price of C$45.92, suggesting a potential upside of 16.19%. Given Canadian Utilities' stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe ATCO is more favorable than Canadian Utilities.
Canadian Utilities received 218 more outperform votes than ATCO when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 59.72% of users gave Canadian Utilities an outperform vote while only 46.39% of users gave ATCO an outperform vote.
14.7% of Canadian Utilities shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 27.9% of ATCO shares are held by institutional investors. 38.0% of Canadian Utilities shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.6% of ATCO shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.
Canadian Utilities has higher earnings, but lower revenue than ATCO. ATCO is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Canadian Utilities, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Canadian Utilities pays an annual dividend of C$1.81 per share and has a dividend yield of 5.8%. ATCO pays an annual dividend of C$1.96 per share and has a dividend yield of 5.0%. Canadian Utilities pays out 84.6% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. ATCO pays out 53.6% of its earnings in the form of a dividend.
In the previous week, Canadian Utilities and Canadian Utilities both had 2 articles in the media. Canadian Utilities' average media sentiment score of 0.51 beat ATCO's score of 0.00 indicating that ATCO is being referred to more favorably in the news media.
Canadian Utilities has a beta of 0.6, meaning that its share price is 40% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, ATCO has a beta of 0.67, meaning that its share price is 33% less volatile than the S&P 500.
Summary
ATCO beats Canadian Utilities on 10 of the 19 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding ACO.X 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 TSE 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.
ACO.X vs. The Competition
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