Critical Review: United Therapeutics (UTHR) & Its Peers

United Therapeutics (NASDAQ:UTHR) is one of 844 public companies in the “Biotechnology” industry, but how does it weigh in compared to its competitors? We will compare United Therapeutics to similar businesses based on the strength of its dividends, risk, valuation, profitability, earnings, institutional ownership and analyst recommendations.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current ratings and target prices for United Therapeutics and its competitors, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
United Therapeutics	1	2	13	0	2.75
United Therapeutics Competitors	9839	15124	45438	1588	2.54

United Therapeutics presently has a consensus price target of $676.40, suggesting a potential upside of 20.35%. As a group, “Biotechnology” companies have a potential upside of 106.41%. Given United Therapeutics’ competitors higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe United Therapeutics has less favorable growth aspects than its competitors.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

94.1% of United Therapeutics shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 47.9% of shares of all “Biotechnology” companies are held by institutional investors. 8.6% of United Therapeutics shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 12.9% of shares of all “Biotechnology” companies are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Risk & Volatility

United Therapeutics has a beta of 0.49, indicating that its stock price is 51% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, United Therapeutics’ competitors have a beta of 1.10, indicating that their average stock price is 10% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

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

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
United Therapeutics	38.61%	19.18%	17.07%
United Therapeutics Competitors	-12,346.73%	-197.60%	-30.56%

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares United Therapeutics and its competitors revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Net Income	Price/Earnings Ratio
United Therapeutics	$3.18 billion	$1.33 billion	21.21
United Therapeutics Competitors	$716.00 million	$12.70 million	-15.11

United Therapeutics has higher revenue and earnings than its competitors. United Therapeutics 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.

Summary

United Therapeutics beats its competitors on 9 of the 13 factors compared.

United Therapeutics Company Profile

United Therapeutics Corporation, a biotechnology company, engages in the development and commercialization of products to address the unmet medical needs of patients with chronic and life-threatening diseases in the United States and internationally. The company offers Tyvaso DPI, an inhaled dry powder via pre-filled and single-use cartridges; Tyvaso, an inhaled solution via ultrasonic nebulizer; Remodulin (treprostinil) injection to treat patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) to diminish symptoms associated with exercise; Orenitram, a tablet dosage form of treprostinil, to delay disease progression and improve exercise capacity in PAH patients; and Adcirca, an oral PDE-5 inhibitor to enhance the exercise ability in PAH patients. It also markets and sells Unituxin (dinutuximab) injection, a monoclonal antibody for treating high-risk neuroblastoma; and Remunity Pump, which contains a pump and separate controller for Remodulin. In addition, the company engages in developing RemoPro and Ralinepag for the treatment of PAH; Aurora-GT, a gene therapy product to rebuild the blood vessels in the lungs; and Nebulized Tyvaso, for the treatment of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, as well as xenografts, which are development-stage organ products. It has licensing and collaboration agreements with DEKA Research & Development Corp. to develop a semi-disposable system for the subcutaneous delivery of treprostinil; MannKind Corporation to develop and license treprostinil inhalation powder and the Dreamboat device; and Arena Pharmaceuticals, Inc. to develop Ralinepag. The company was incorporated in 1996 and is headquartered in Silver Spring, Maryland.