CE vs. ECL, IFF, ALB, RPM, NEU, ASH, BCPC, FUL, KWR, and SXT
Should you be buying Celanese stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of Celanese include Ecolab (ECL), International Flavors & Fragrances (IFF), Albemarle (ALB), RPM International (RPM), NewMarket (NEU), Ashland (ASH), Balchem (BCPC), H.B. Fuller (FUL), Quaker Chemical (KWR), and Sensient Technologies (SXT). These companies are all part of the "specialty chemicals" industry.
Celanese (NYSE:CE) and Ecolab (NYSE:ECL) are both large-cap basic materials companies, but which is the superior business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their community ranking, institutional ownership, profitability, media sentiment, earnings, risk, dividends, valuation and analyst recommendations.
In the previous week, Celanese had 6 more articles in the media than Ecolab. MarketBeat recorded 15 mentions for Celanese and 9 mentions for Ecolab. Ecolab's average media sentiment score of 0.87 beat Celanese's score of 0.80 indicating that Ecolab is being referred to more favorably in the news media.
Celanese pays an annual dividend of $2.80 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.8%. Ecolab pays an annual dividend of $2.28 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.0%. Celanese pays out 15.4% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Ecolab pays out 42.2% 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. Celanese is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.
Celanese has a net margin of 18.60% compared to Ecolab's net margin of 10.01%. Ecolab's return on equity of 20.56% beat Celanese's return on equity.
Celanese currently has a consensus price target of $156.78, indicating a potential upside of 3.12%. Ecolab has a consensus price target of $239.56, indicating a potential upside of 3.04%. Given Celanese's higher probable upside, equities analysts plainly believe Celanese is more favorable than Ecolab.
98.9% of Celanese shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 74.9% of Ecolab shares are held by institutional investors. 0.3% of Celanese shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 0.0% of Ecolab shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.
Ecolab received 58 more outperform votes than Celanese when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 64.75% of users gave Ecolab an outperform vote while only 63.73% of users gave Celanese an outperform vote.
Celanese has higher earnings, but lower revenue than Ecolab. Celanese is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Ecolab, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Celanese has a beta of 1.37, indicating that its share price is 37% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Ecolab has a beta of 1.09, indicating that its share price is 9% more volatile than the S&P 500.
Summary
Celanese and Ecolab tied by winning 10 of the 20 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding CE 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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