Albemarle (ALB) and Its Competitors Financial Review

Albemarle (NYSE:ALB) is one of 295 publicly-traded companies in the “Chemicals” industry, but how does it contrast to its competitors? We will compare Albemarle to similar businesses based on the strength of its risk, dividends, earnings, institutional ownership, valuation, analyst recommendations and profitability.

Dividends

Albemarle pays an annual dividend of $1.64 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.7%. Albemarle pays out 39.6% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. As a group, “Chemicals” companies pay a dividend yield of 3.1% and pay out 104.5% of their earnings in the form of a dividend. Albemarle has raised its dividend for 30 consecutive years.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of recent recommendations for Albemarle and its competitors, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Albemarle	1	8	15	0	2.58
Albemarle Competitors	3258	12227	14147	519	2.40

Albemarle presently has a consensus price target of $174.05, suggesting a potential upside of 83.25%. As a group, “Chemicals” companies have a potential upside of 6.93%. Given Albemarle’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, equities analysts clearly believe Albemarle is more favorable than its competitors.

Profitability

This table compares Albemarle and its competitors’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Albemarle	10.40%	14.91%	7.58%
Albemarle Competitors	-59.13%	-0.46%	-1.40%

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares Albemarle and its competitors gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Net Income	Price/Earnings Ratio
Albemarle	$5.14 billion	-$510.63 million	22.94
Albemarle Competitors	$6.41 billion	$230.87 million	9.87

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

Institutional & Insider Ownership

92.9% of Albemarle shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 48.0% of shares of all “Chemicals” companies are held by institutional investors. 0.4% of Albemarle shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 13.9% of shares of all “Chemicals” companies are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Risk and Volatility

Albemarle has a beta of 1.34, suggesting that its stock price is 34% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Albemarle’s competitors have a beta of 0.93, suggesting that their average stock price is 7% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Albemarle beats its competitors on 10 of the 15 factors compared.

About Albemarle

Albemarle Corporation is a specialty chemicals company that produces lithium, bromine and refining catalysts. Its products serve industries including energy storage, transportation, electronics, petroleum refining and pharmaceuticals. The company supplies lithium compounds used in rechargeable batteries and other applications. It also makes bromine-based products for uses such as flame retardants and water treatment, along with catalysts used in refining petroleum. Albemarle traces its history to 1887 and is headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina.