Head-To-Head Review: Novavax (NASDAQ:NVAX) & Alnylam Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:ALNY)

Alnylam Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:ALNY) and Novavax (NASDAQ:NVAX) are both healthcare companies, but which is the better stock? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their dividends, valuation, risk, earnings, profitability, institutional ownership and analyst recommendations.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

93.0% of Alnylam Pharmaceuticals shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 53.0% of Novavax shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.9% of Alnylam Pharmaceuticals shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 1.6% of Novavax shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Alnylam Pharmaceuticals and Novavax”s revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Alnylam Pharmaceuticals	$3.71 billion	8.38	$313.75 million	$5.38	43.25
Novavax	$1.12 billion	1.87	$440.30 million	($1.52)	-8.39

Novavax has lower revenue, but higher earnings than Alnylam Pharmaceuticals. Novavax is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Risk & Volatility

Alnylam Pharmaceuticals has a beta of 0.28, meaning that its stock price is 72% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Novavax has a beta of 2.44, meaning that its stock price is 144% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares Alnylam Pharmaceuticals and Novavax’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Alnylam Pharmaceuticals	15.26%	84.93%	14.30%
Novavax	-59.87%	-14.82%	-13.35%

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of current ratings for Alnylam Pharmaceuticals and Novavax, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Alnylam Pharmaceuticals	0	6	16	3	2.88
Novavax	2	2	5	0	2.33

Alnylam Pharmaceuticals presently has a consensus target price of $366.65, suggesting a potential upside of 57.58%. Novavax has a consensus target price of $14.00, suggesting a potential upside of 9.80%. Given Alnylam Pharmaceuticals’ stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities research analysts plainly believe Alnylam Pharmaceuticals is more favorable than Novavax.

Summary

Alnylam Pharmaceuticals beats Novavax on 12 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Alnylam Pharmaceuticals

Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a biopharmaceutical company, focuses on discovering, developing, and commercializing novel therapeutics based on ribonucleic acid interference. Its marketed products include ONPATTRO (patisiran) for the treatment of the polyneuropathy of hereditary transthyretin-mediated amyloidosis in adults; AMVUTTRA for the treatment of hATTR amyloidosis with polyneuropathy in adults; GIVLAARI for the treatment of adults with acute hepatic porphyria; and OXLUMO for the treatment of primary hyperoxaluria type 1. In addition, the company develops patisiran for the treatment of transthyretin amyloidosis, or ATTR amyloidosis, with cardiomyopathy; cemdisiran to treat complement-mediated diseases; Belcesiran for the treatment of alpha-1 liver disease; Elebsiran to treat chronic HBV infection; Zilebesiran to treat hypertension; ALN-APP to treat Alzheimer's disease and cerebral amyloid angiopathy; and ALN-HSD to treat NASH. Further, it offers Fitusiran for the treatment of hemophilia, Inclisiran to treat hypercholesterolemia, lumasiran for the treatment of advanced PH1, and vutrisiran for the treatment of ATTR amyloidosis, which is in phase 3 clinical trial. Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc. has strategic collaborations with Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc. to discover, develop, and commercialize RNAi therapeutics for a range of diseases by addressing therapeutic targets expressed in the eye and CNS; and Roche to develop pharmaceutical products containing zilebesiran. It also has license and collaboration agreements with Novartis AG; Vir Biotechnology, Inc.; Dicerna Pharmaceuticals, Inc.; Ionis Pharmaceuticals, Inc.; and PeptiDream, Inc. The company was founded in 2002 and is headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

About Novavax

Novavax, Inc., a biotechnology company, that promotes improved health by discovering, developing, and commercializing vaccines to protect against serious infectious diseases. It offers vaccine platform that combines a recombinant protein approach, nanoparticle technology, and its patented Matrix-M adjuvant to enhance the immune response. It focuses on urgent health challenges, which is evaluating vaccines for COVID-19, influenza, and COVID-19 influenza combination. The company is commercializing a COVID-19 vaccine, NVX-CoV2373 under the brand names of Nuvaxovid, Covovax, and Novavax COVID-19 Vaccine, adjuvanted for adult and adolescent populations as a primary series and for both homologous and heterologous booster indications. It is also developing R21/Matrix-M adjuvant malaria vaccine. Novavax, Inc. was incorporated in 1987 and is headquartered in Gaithersburg, Maryland.