Ryerson (RYZ) versus Its Peers Critical Review

Ryerson (NYSE:RYZ) is one of 158 publicly-traded companies in the “Trading Companies & Distributors” industry, but how does it weigh in compared to its rivals? We will compare Ryerson to similar businesses based on the strength of its valuation, earnings, institutional ownership, dividends, risk, profitability and analyst recommendations.

Volatility and Risk

Ryerson has a beta of 1.65, indicating that its share price is 65% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Ryerson’s rivals have a beta of 1.28, indicating that their average share price is 28% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Ryerson and its rivals gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Net Income	Price/Earnings Ratio
Ryerson	$4.57 billion	-$56.40 million	-20.44
Ryerson Competitors	$6.49 billion	$365.60 million	20.97

Ryerson’s rivals have higher revenue and earnings than Ryerson. Ryerson is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than its rivals, indicating that it is currently more affordable than other companies in its industry.

Dividends

Ryerson pays an annual dividend of $0.75 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.0%. Ryerson pays out -60.5% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. As a group, “Trading Companies & Distributors” companies pay a dividend yield of 2.9% and pay out 36.7% of their earnings in the form of a dividend. Ryerson is clearly a better dividend stock than its rivals, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

94.8% of Ryerson shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 50.9% of shares of all “Trading Companies & Distributors” companies are held by institutional investors. 6.6% of Ryerson shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 16.9% of shares of all “Trading Companies & Distributors” companies are held by 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.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current ratings and recommmendations for Ryerson and its rivals, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Ryerson	1	2	0	0	1.67
Ryerson Competitors	1420	4866	6658	220	2.43

As a group, “Trading Companies & Distributors” companies have a potential upside of 11.22%. Given Ryerson’s rivals stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Ryerson has less favorable growth aspects than its rivals.

Profitability

This table compares Ryerson and its rivals’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Ryerson	-0.56%	-0.62%	-0.21%
Ryerson Competitors	0.71%	-34.50%	3.15%

Summary

Ryerson rivals beat Ryerson on 10 of the 15 factors compared.

Ryerson Company Profile

Ryerson Holding Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, processes and distributes industrial metals in the United States, Canada, Mexico, and China. It offers a line of products in carbon steel, stainless steel, alloy steels, and aluminum, as well as nickel and red metals in various shapes and forms, including coils, sheets, rounds, hexagons, square and flat bars, plates, structural, and tubing. The company also provides various processing services, such as bending, beveling, blanking, blasting, burning, cutting-to-length, drilling, embossing, flattening, forming, grinding, laser cutting, machining, notching, painting, perforating, polishing, punching, rolling, sawing, scribing, shearing, slitting, stamping, tapping, threading, welding, or other techniques to process materials. It serves various industries, including commercial ground transportation, metal fabrication and machine shops, industrial machinery and equipment manufacturing, consumer durable equipment, HVAC manufacturing, construction equipment manufacturing, food processing and agricultural equipment manufacturing, and oil and gas. The company was founded in 1842 and is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois.