Cleveland-Cliffs (CLF) & Its Competitors Critical Contrast

Cleveland-Cliffs (NYSE:CLF) is one of 1,984 public companies in the “Metals & Mining” industry, but how does it contrast to its rivals? We will compare Cleveland-Cliffs to similar businesses based on the strength of its analyst recommendations, earnings, valuation, dividends, profitability, institutional ownership and risk.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Cleveland-Cliffs and its rivals gross revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Net Income	Price/Earnings Ratio
Cleveland-Cliffs	$18.61 billion	-$1.48 billion	-16.66
Cleveland-Cliffs Competitors	$174.33 billion	$279.03 million	-47.14

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

Institutional & Insider Ownership

67.7% of Cleveland-Cliffs shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 16.0% of shares of all “Metals & Mining” companies are owned by institutional investors. 0.9% of Cleveland-Cliffs shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 17.5% of shares of all “Metals & Mining” companies are owned 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.

Profitability

This table compares Cleveland-Cliffs and its rivals’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Cleveland-Cliffs	-2.36%	-6.83%	-2.05%
Cleveland-Cliffs Competitors	-1,168,050,136,845,918,000.00%	-50.94%	-2.11%

Risk & Volatility

Cleveland-Cliffs has a beta of 2.09, meaning that its share price is 109% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Cleveland-Cliffs’ rivals have a beta of 1.01, meaning that their average share price is 1% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of recent recommendations and price targets for Cleveland-Cliffs and its rivals, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Cleveland-Cliffs	2	6	4	0	2.17
Cleveland-Cliffs Competitors	6394	22556	32247	1790	2.47

Cleveland-Cliffs presently has a consensus target price of $13.82, indicating a potential downside of 2.41%. As a group, “Metals & Mining” companies have a potential upside of 28.72%. Given Cleveland-Cliffs’ rivals stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Cleveland-Cliffs has less favorable growth aspects than its rivals.

Summary

Cleveland-Cliffs rivals beat Cleveland-Cliffs on 7 of the 13 factors compared.

Cleveland-Cliffs Company Profile

Cleveland-Cliffs is the largest flat-rolled steel company and the largest iron ore pellet producer in North America. The company is vertically integrated from mining through iron making, steelmaking, rolling, finishing and downstream with hot and cold stamping of steel parts and components. The company was formerly known as Cliffs Natural Resources Inc. and changed its name to Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. in August 2017. Cleveland-Cliffs Inc. was founded in 1847 and is headquartered in Cleveland, Ohio.