Cognex (CGNX) vs. Its Rivals Financial Contrast

Cognex (NASDAQ:CGNX) is one of 377 public companies in the “Electronic Equipment, Instruments & Components” industry, but how does it weigh in compared to its competitors? We will compare Cognex to similar companies based on the strength of its risk, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, earnings, dividends, profitability and valuation.

Profitability

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

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Cognex	16.05%	13.50%	10.02%
Cognex Competitors	-158.15%	-25.69%	-6.84%

Dividends

Cognex pays an annual dividend of $0.34 per share and has a dividend yield of 0.6%. Cognex pays out 33.0% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. As a group, “Electronic Equipment, Instruments & Components” companies pay a dividend yield of 1.9% and pay out 70.3% of their earnings in the form of a dividend. Cognex has increased its dividend for 10 consecutive years.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares Cognex and its competitors top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Net Income	Price/Earnings Ratio
Cognex	$994.36 million	$114.44 million	54.77
Cognex Competitors	$114.91 billion	$166.60 million	5.93

Cognex’s competitors have higher revenue and earnings than Cognex. Cognex 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.

Risk & Volatility

Cognex has a beta of 1.48, indicating that its share price is 48% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Cognex’s competitors have a beta of -0.32, indicating that their average share price is 132% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent ratings and price targets for Cognex and its competitors, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Cognex	0	7	10	1	2.67
Cognex Competitors	2047	7594	10406	658	2.47

Cognex presently has a consensus target price of $75.57, suggesting a potential upside of 33.97%. As a group, “Electronic Equipment, Instruments & Components” companies have a potential upside of 36.56%. Given Cognex’s competitors higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Cognex has less favorable growth aspects than its competitors.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

88.1% of Cognex shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 43.5% of shares of all “Electronic Equipment, Instruments & Components” companies are held by institutional investors. 1.7% of Cognex shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 16.0% of shares of all “Electronic Equipment, Instruments & Components” companies are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Summary

Cognex beats its competitors on 10 of the 15 factors compared.

Cognex Company Profile

Cognex Corporation provides machine vision products that capture and analyze visual information to automate manufacturing and distribution tasks worldwide. Its machine vision products are used to automate the manufacturing and tracking of discrete items, including mobile phones, electric vehicle batteries, and e-commerce packages by locating, identifying, inspecting, and measuring them during the manufacturing or distribution process. The company offers VisionPro software, a suite of patented vision tools for advanced programming; QuickBuild that allows customers to build vision applications with a graphical, flowchart-based programming interface; and Cognex deep learning vision software. It also provides a range of inspection tasks, including part location, identification, measurement, assembly verification, and robotic guidance; vision sensors for vision applications, such as checking the presence and size of parts; and the In-Sight product line of vision systems and sensors. In addition, the company offers DataMan, an image-based barcode readers and barcode verifiers. It sells its products to automotive, logistics, consumer electronics, medical-related, semiconductor, consumer products, food and beverage, and others, as well as through a network of distributors and integrators. The company was incorporated in 1981 and is headquartered in Natick, Massachusetts.