Contrasting Solvay (SVYSF) & The Competition

Institutional & Insider Ownership

18.8% of Solvay shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 47.5% of shares of all “Chemicals” companies are held by institutional investors. 14.2% of shares of all “Chemicals” companies are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Solvay and its competitors top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Net Income	Price/Earnings Ratio
Solvay	N/A	N/A	-24.86
Solvay Competitors	$6.26 billion	$217.41 million	-11.55

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

Profitability

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

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Solvay	N/A	N/A	N/A
Solvay Competitors	-119.59%	-13.33%	-2.23%

Dividends

Solvay pays an annual dividend of $2.40 per share and has a dividend yield of 7.8%. Solvay pays out -193.5% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. As a group, “Chemicals” companies pay a dividend yield of 3.2% and pay out 101.3% of their earnings in the form of a dividend. Solvay is clearly a better dividend stock than its competitors, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.

Summary

Solvay beats its competitors on 5 of the 9 factors compared.

About Solvay

Solvay SA provides advanced materials and specialty chemicals worldwide. It operates through four segments: Materials, Chemicals, Solutions, and Corporate & Business Services. The Materials segment offers specialty polymers, including aromatic polymers, high barrier polymers, and fluoropolymers for the electronics, automotive, aerospace, and healthcare industries; and composite materials for aerospace engineered materials market. The Chemicals segment produces and sells soda ash and sodium bicarbonate primarily to the flat and container glass industries, as well as for use in detergents, pharmaceutical, and feed and food industries; hydrogen peroxide for use primarily in the paper industry to bleach pulp, as well as chemicals, electronics, food, mining, and environment; and dispersible silica for tire manufacturers; and solvent solutions, phenols and derivatives, polyamide derivatives and smart, functional, and sustainable yarns and polymers. The Solutions segment offers specialty chemicals for agro, home and personal care, coatings, and industrial markets; technology solutions in specialty mining reagents, phosphine-based chemistry, and solutions for the stabilization of polymers; fluorine and rare-earth formulations for automotive, electronics, agrochemical, and construction applications; and vanillin for the food, flavors, and fragrances industries, as well as value-added intermediates used in monomers and polymers, pharmaceuticals, agrochemicals, and electronics. This segment also provides various products for upstream oilfield chemicals sector, as well as sodium hypophosphite for metal plating and other applications; and PROBAN, a technological process that offers durable flame retardant properties to cotton-based textiles. The Corporate & Business Services segment provides energy and other business services. The company was founded in 1863 and is headquartered in Brussels, Belgium.