Critical Comparison: Cadre (NYSE:CDRE) versus Intuitive Surgical (NASDAQ:ISRG)

Intuitive Surgical (NASDAQ:ISRG) and Cadre (NYSE:CDRE) are both medical companies, but which is the better stock? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their earnings, profitability, risk, analyst recommendations, valuation, institutional ownership and dividends.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

83.6% of Intuitive Surgical shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 44.0% of Cadre shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.9% of Intuitive Surgical shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 37.0% of Cadre shares are owned 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.

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of current ratings for Intuitive Surgical and Cadre, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Intuitive Surgical	1	3	15	0	2.74
Cadre	0	2	3	0	2.60

Intuitive Surgical presently has a consensus price target of $554.17, indicating a potential downside of 4.47%. Cadre has a consensus price target of $39.75, indicating a potential upside of 14.92%. Given Cadre’s higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Cadre is more favorable than Intuitive Surgical.

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Intuitive Surgical and Cadre”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Intuitive Surgical	$7.87 billion	26.26	$1.80 billion	$6.22	93.27
Cadre	$516.16 million	2.72	$38.64 million	$0.83	41.67

Intuitive Surgical has higher revenue and earnings than Cadre. Cadre is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Intuitive Surgical, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Volatility and Risk

Intuitive Surgical has a beta of 1.39, meaning that its share price is 39% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Cadre has a beta of 1.24, meaning that its share price is 24% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares Intuitive Surgical and Cadre’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Intuitive Surgical	28.51%	13.41%	11.83%
Cadre	6.34%	12.88%	6.06%

Summary

Intuitive Surgical beats Cadre on 12 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Intuitive Surgical

Intuitive Surgical, Inc. develops, manufactures, and markets products that enable physicians and healthcare providers to enhance the quality of and access to minimally invasive care in the United States and internationally. The company offers the da Vinci Surgical System that enables complex surgery using a minimally invasive approach; and Ion endoluminal system, which extends its commercial offerings beyond surgery into diagnostic procedures enabling minimally invasive biopsies in the lung. It also provides a suite of stapling, energy, and core instrumentation for its multi-port da Vinci surgical systems; progressive learning pathways to support the use of its technology; infrastructure of service and support specialists, a complement of services to its customers, including installation, repair, maintenance, 24/7 technical support, and proactive system health monitoring; and integrated digital capabilities providing connected offerings, streamlining performance for hospitals with program-enhancing insights. The company sells its products through direct sales organizations, such as capital and clinical sales teams. It has a collaboration agreement with FluoGuide A/S for head & neck cancer. The company was incorporated in 1995 and is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California.

About Cadre

Cadre Holdings, Inc. manufactures and distributes safety that provides protection to users in hazardous or life-threatening situations in the United States and internationally. The company operates in two segments, Products and Distribution. It offers body armor product, such as concealable, corrections, and tactical armor under the Safariland and Protech Tactical brand names; survival suits, remotely operated vehicles, specialty tools, blast sensors, accessories, and vehicle blast attenuation seats for bomb safety technicians; bomb suits; duty gear, including belts and accessories; and other protective equipment comprising communications gear, forensic and investigation products, firearms cleaning solutions, and crowd control products. The company also offers third-party products, such as uniforms, optics, boots, firearms, and ammunition. It serves first responders, such as state and local law enforcement, fire and rescue, explosive ordnance disposal technicians, emergency medical technicians, fishing, and wildlife enforcement and departments of corrections, as well as federal agencies including the U.S. Department of State, U.S. Department of Defense, U.S. Department of Interior, U.S. Department of Justice, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Department of Corrections, the Department of Energy, Los Alamos National Laboratories, Waste Isolation Plant, and various foreign government agencies. Cadre Holdings, Inc. was founded in 1964 and is headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida.