Head-To-Head Review: Tonix Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:TNXP) and Autolus Therapeutics (NASDAQ:AUTL)

Autolus Therapeutics (NASDAQ:AUTL) and Tonix Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:TNXP) are both small-cap healthcare companies, but which is the better investment? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their risk, valuation, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, dividends, earnings and profitability.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent ratings for Autolus Therapeutics and Tonix Pharmaceuticals, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Autolus Therapeutics	1	1	3	2	2.86
Tonix Pharmaceuticals	1	0	1	2	3.00

Autolus Therapeutics currently has a consensus price target of $10.00, suggesting a potential upside of 604.23%. Tonix Pharmaceuticals has a consensus price target of $22.33, suggesting a potential upside of 333.66%. Given Autolus Therapeutics’ higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe Autolus Therapeutics is more favorable than Tonix Pharmaceuticals.

Profitability

This table compares Autolus Therapeutics and Tonix Pharmaceuticals’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Autolus Therapeutics	-238.66%	-178.66%	-49.34%
Tonix Pharmaceuticals	-548.64%	-68.99%	-61.31%

Risk & Volatility

Autolus Therapeutics has a beta of 2.15, meaning that its share price is 115% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Tonix Pharmaceuticals has a beta of 1.78, meaning that its share price is 78% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares Autolus Therapeutics and Tonix Pharmaceuticals”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Autolus Therapeutics	$75.39 million	5.01	-$287.53 million	($1.06)	-1.34
Tonix Pharmaceuticals	$13.11 million	6.74	-$124.02 million	($12.94)	-0.40

Tonix Pharmaceuticals has lower revenue, but higher earnings than Autolus Therapeutics. Autolus Therapeutics is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Tonix Pharmaceuticals, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

72.8% of Autolus Therapeutics shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 82.3% of Tonix Pharmaceuticals shares are held by institutional investors. 25.7% of Autolus Therapeutics shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 2.0% of Tonix Pharmaceuticals shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Summary

Autolus Therapeutics beats Tonix Pharmaceuticals on 8 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Autolus Therapeutics

Autolus Therapeutics plc, a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company, develops T cell therapies for the treatment of cancer and autoimmune diseases. The company's clinical-stage programs include obecabtagene autoleucel (AUTO1), a CD19-targeting programmed T cell investigational therapy that is in Phase 1b/2 clinical trial for the treatment of adult ALL; AUTO1/22, which is in a Phase 1 clinical trial in pediatric patients with relapsed or refractory ALL; AUTO4, a programmed T cell investigational therapy for the treatment of peripheral T-cell lymphoma targeting TRBC1 and TRBC2; AUTO6NG, a programmed T cell investigational therapy targeting GD2 in development for the treatment of neuroblastoma; and AUTO8, a product candidate to treat multiple myeloma. It focuses on developing AUTO5, a preclinical TRBC2 programmed T cell product candidate for the treatment of peripheral T-cell lymphoma. Autolus Therapeutics plc was incorporated in 2014 and is headquartered in London, the United Kingdom.

About Tonix Pharmaceuticals

Tonix Pharmaceuticals Holding Corp., a biopharmaceutical company, focuses on developing, discovering, commercializing, and licensing therapeutics to treat and prevent human disease and alleviate suffering. It markets Zembrace SymTouch and Tosymra for the treatment of acute migraine with or without aura in adults. Its portfolio focuses on central nervous system disorders, as well as rare disease, immunology, and infectious disease product candidates. The company’s priority is to submit a New Drug Application (NDA) to the FDA for TNX-102 SL (cyclobenzaprine HCl sublingual tablet), which has completed two positive Phase 3 studies for the management of fibromyalgia. TNX-102 SL is also being developed to treat fibromyalgia-type Long COVID, a chronic post-acute COVID-19 condition. Its TNX-1300 (cocaine esterase) is a biologic designed to treat cocaine intoxication and has been granted breakthrough therapy designation by the FDA. The company’s rare disease development portfolio comprises TNX-2900, an intranasal potentiated oxytocin for the treatment of Prader-Willi syndrome (PWS). Its immunology portfolio includes TNX-1500, which is a biologic to address organ transplant rejection and autoimmune diseases. The company’s infectious disease pipeline includes TNX-801, a vaccine in development to prevent smallpox and mpox. TNX-801 also serves as the live virus vaccine platform or recombinant pox vaccine platform for other infectious diseases, including TNX-1800 and TNX-1850, in development as a vaccine to protect against COVID-19. Its infectious disease development portfolio also comprises TNX-3900, and TNX-4200 are orally available CD45 antagonists in preclinical development. Tonix Pharmaceuticals Holding Corp. has collaboration agreement with Bilthoven Biologicals to advance TNX-801 mpox vaccine candidate; and with X-Chem, Inc. to develop broad-spectrum antivirals. The company was founded in 2007 and is headquartered in Chatham, New Jersey.