Elevance Health (NYSE:ELV) vs. DocGo (NASDAQ:DCGO) Critical Contrast

DocGo (NASDAQ:DCGO) and Elevance Health (NYSE:ELV) are both medical companies, but which is the better business? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their institutional ownership, earnings, analyst recommendations, risk, profitability, dividends and valuation.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of recent ratings for DocGo and Elevance Health, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
DocGo	1	4	2	0	2.14
Elevance Health	1	11	13	0	2.48

DocGo presently has a consensus target price of $3.21, indicating a potential upside of 259.30%. Elevance Health has a consensus target price of $400.85, indicating a potential upside of 7.52%. Given DocGo’s higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe DocGo is more favorable than Elevance Health.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

56.4% of DocGo shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 89.2% of Elevance Health shares are owned by institutional investors. 3.8% of DocGo shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.3% of Elevance Health shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Volatility and Risk

DocGo has a beta of 0.94, meaning that its share price is 6% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Elevance Health has a beta of 0.51, meaning that its share price is 49% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares DocGo and Elevance Health’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
DocGo	-14.02%	-9.11%	-6.44%
Elevance Health	2.84%	16.17%	5.78%

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares DocGo and Elevance Health”s gross revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
DocGo	$616.55 million	0.14	$19.99 million	($0.52)	-1.72
Elevance Health	$177.01 billion	0.47	$5.98 billion	$24.46	15.24

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

Summary

Elevance Health beats DocGo on 11 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About DocGo

DocGo Inc. provides mobile health and medical transportation services for various health care providers in the United States and the United Kingdom. The company's transportation services include emergency response services; and non-emergency transport services comprise ambulance and wheelchair transportation services. It also offers mobile health services through its platform that are performed at home, offices, and other locations; event services, which include on-site healthcare support at sporting events and concerts; and total care management solutions comprising healthcare services and ancillary services, such as shelter. DocGo Inc. was founded in 2015 and is headquartered in New York, New York.

About Elevance Health

Elevance Health, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, operates as a health benefits company in the United States. The company operates through four segments: Health Benefits, CarelonRx, Carelon Services, and Corporate & Other. It offers a variety of health plans and services to program members; health products; an array of fee-based administrative managed care services; and specialty and other insurance products and services, such as stop loss, dental, vision, life, disability, and supplemental health insurance benefits. The company operates in the pharmacy services business; and markets and offers pharmacy services, including pharmacy benefit management, as well as home delivery and specialty pharmacies, claims adjudication, formulary management, pharmacy networks, rebate administration, a prescription drug database, and member services. In addition, it provides healthcare-related services and capabilities, including utilization management, behavioral health, integrated care delivery, palliative care, payment integrity services, subrogation services, and health and wellness programs, as well as services related to data management, information technology, and business operations. Further, the company is involved in the National Government Services business. The company provides its services under the Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield, Wellpoint, and Carelon brand names. The company was formerly known as Anthem, Inc. and changed its name to Elevance Health, Inc. in June 2022. Elevance Health, Inc. was incorporated in 2001 and is headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana.