Bio-Rad Laboratories (NYSE:BIO) & Qiagen (NYSE:QGEN) Head-To-Head Review

Qiagen (NYSE:QGEN) and Bio-Rad Laboratories (NYSE:BIO) are both mid-cap healthcare companies, but which is the superior investment? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, dividends, analyst recommendations, profitability, risk, earnings and valuation.

Risk & Volatility

Qiagen has a beta of 0.63, suggesting that its share price is 37% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Bio-Rad Laboratories has a beta of 1.06, suggesting that its share price is 6% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

70.0% of Qiagen shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 65.2% of Bio-Rad Laboratories shares are owned by institutional investors. 9.0% of Qiagen shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 30.3% of Bio-Rad Laboratories shares are owned 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.

Profitability

This table compares Qiagen and Bio-Rad Laboratories’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Qiagen	19.49%	14.24%	8.23%
Bio-Rad Laboratories	8.59%	3.54%	2.48%

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent ratings for Qiagen and Bio-Rad Laboratories, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Qiagen	1	8	4	1	2.36
Bio-Rad Laboratories	2	2	1	0	1.80

Qiagen presently has a consensus target price of $43.93, suggesting a potential upside of 2.98%. Bio-Rad Laboratories has a consensus target price of $343.33, suggesting a potential downside of 3.53%. Given Qiagen’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Qiagen is more favorable than Bio-Rad Laboratories.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares Qiagen and Bio-Rad Laboratories”s gross revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Qiagen	$2.10 billion	4.18	$424.88 million	$1.95	21.87
Bio-Rad Laboratories	$2.58 billion	3.69	$759.90 million	$8.25	43.14

Bio-Rad Laboratories has higher revenue and earnings than Qiagen. Qiagen is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Bio-Rad Laboratories, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Summary

Qiagen beats Bio-Rad Laboratories on 9 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Qiagen

QIAGEN NV is a holding company, which engages in the provision of Sample to Insight solutions that enable customers to gain valuable molecular insights from samples containing the building blocks of life. The company sample technologies isolate and process DNA, RNA, and proteins from blood, tissue, and other materials. The firm assay technologies make these biomolecules visible and ready for analysis. Its bioinformatics software and knowledge bases interpret data to report relevant, actionable insights. The company was founded by Detlev H. Riesner and Metin Colpan on April 29, 1996, and is headquartered in Venlo, the Netherlands.

About Bio-Rad Laboratories

Bio-Rad Laboratories, Inc. manufactures and distributes life science research and clinical diagnostic products in the United States, Europe, Asia, Canada, and Latin America. It operates through two segments, Life Science and Clinical Diagnostics. The company develops, manufactures, and markets instruments, systems, reagents, and consumables to separate, purify, characterize, and quantitate biological materials such as cells, proteins, and nucleic acids for proteomics, genomics, biopharmaceutical production, cellular biology, and food safety markets. It also designs, manufactures, markets, and supports test systems, informatics systems, test kits, and specialized quality controls for hospitals, diagnostic reference, transfusion, and physician office laboratories. The company offers its products through its direct sales force, as well as through distributors, agents, brokers, and resellers. Bio-Rad Laboratories, Inc. was founded in 1952 and is headquartered in Hercules, California.