DGX vs. LH, DVA, CHE, RCM, CRVL, AMED, AMN, MD, CCRN, and NTRA
Should you be buying Quest Diagnostics stock or one of its competitors? The main competitors of Quest Diagnostics include Laboratory Co. of America (LH), DaVita (DVA), Chemed (CHE), R1 RCM (RCM), CorVel (CRVL), Amedisys (AMED), AMN Healthcare Services (AMN), Pediatrix Medical Group (MD), Cross Country Healthcare (CCRN), and Natera (NTRA).
Quest Diagnostics (NYSE:DGX) and Laboratory Co. of America (NYSE:LH) are both large-cap medical companies, but which is the superior stock? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their media sentiment, risk, community ranking, analyst recommendations, dividends, institutional ownership, valuation, earnings and profitability.
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 presently has a consensus target price of $146.67, suggesting a potential upside of 3.31%. Laboratory Co. of America has a consensus target price of $241.86, suggesting a potential upside of 24.09%. Given Laboratory Co. of America's stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Laboratory Co. of America is more favorable than Quest Diagnostics.
Quest Diagnostics pays an annual dividend of $2.84 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.0%. Laboratory Co. of America pays an annual dividend of $2.88 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.5%. Quest Diagnostics pays out 38.2% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Laboratory Co. of America pays out 57.9% 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.
88.1% of Quest Diagnostics shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 95.9% of Laboratory Co. of America shares are held by institutional investors. 0.8% of Quest Diagnostics shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.9% of Laboratory Co. of America shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.
Quest Diagnostics has a beta of 0.88, suggesting that its stock price is 12% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Laboratory Co. of America has a beta of 1.02, suggesting that its stock price is 2% more volatile than the S&P 500.
In the previous week, Laboratory Co. of America had 1 more articles in the media than Quest Diagnostics. MarketBeat recorded 11 mentions for Laboratory Co. of America and 10 mentions for Quest Diagnostics. Quest Diagnostics' average media sentiment score of 0.98 beat Laboratory Co. of America's score of 0.57 indicating that Quest Diagnostics is being referred to more favorably in the media.
Quest Diagnostics has higher earnings, but lower revenue 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 received 80 more outperform votes than Quest Diagnostics when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 64.18% of users gave Laboratory Co. of America an outperform vote while only 49.48% of users gave Quest Diagnostics an outperform vote.
Summary
Laboratory Co. of America beats Quest Diagnostics on 11 of the 20 factors compared between the two stocks.
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This chart shows the number of new MarketBeat users adding DGX 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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