Reviewing United Therapeutics (UTHR) and Its Peers

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

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of recent ratings and target prices for United Therapeutics and its rivals, as provided 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	9800	15081	45386	1576	2.54

United Therapeutics currently has a consensus target price of $676.40, suggesting a potential upside of 19.56%. As a group, “Biotechnology” companies have a potential upside of 108.06%. Given United Therapeutics’ rivals higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe United Therapeutics has less favorable growth aspects than its rivals.

Profitability

This table compares United Therapeutics and its rivals’ 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	-12,359.35%	-203.09%	-30.93%

Earnings and Valuation

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

	Gross Revenue	Net Income	Price/Earnings Ratio
United Therapeutics	$3.18 billion	$1.33 billion	20.24
United Therapeutics Competitors	$723.49 million	$12.98 million	-10.84

United Therapeutics has higher revenue and earnings than its rivals. United Therapeutics 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 and Insider Ownership

94.1% of United Therapeutics shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 47.9% of shares of all “Biotechnology” companies are owned by institutional investors. 8.6% of United Therapeutics shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 13.0% of shares of all “Biotechnology” 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.

Volatility & Risk

United Therapeutics has a beta of 0.49, meaning that its stock price is 51% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, United Therapeutics’ rivals have a beta of 1.15, meaning that their average stock price is 15% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

United Therapeutics beats its rivals 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.