Head to Head Review: Utz Brands (UTZ) vs. Its Peers

Utz Brands (NYSE:UTZ) is one of 69 public companies in the “FOOD – MISC/DIVERSIFIED” industry, but how does it compare to its peers? We will compare Utz Brands to similar companies based on the strength of its institutional ownership, risk, earnings, dividends, valuation, profitability and analyst recommendations.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of recent ratings for Utz Brands and its peers, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Utz Brands	0	2	6	0	2.75
Utz Brands Competitors	704	3406	3718	151	2.42

Utz Brands presently has a consensus target price of $17.81, indicating a potential upside of 35.48%. As a group, “FOOD – MISC/DIVERSIFIED” companies have a potential upside of 21.20%. Given Utz Brands’ stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, research analysts clearly believe Utz Brands is more favorable than its peers.

Risk and Volatility

Utz Brands has a beta of 1.18, meaning that its stock price is 18% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Utz Brands’ peers have a beta of 0.83, meaning that their average stock price is 17% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Dividends

Utz Brands pays an annual dividend of $0.24 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.8%. Utz Brands pays out 75.0% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. As a group, “FOOD – MISC/DIVERSIFIED” companies pay a dividend yield of 1.2% and pay out 38.7% of their earnings in the form of a dividend. Utz Brands has raised its dividend for 3 consecutive years.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

96.0% of Utz Brands shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 54.9% of shares of all “FOOD – MISC/DIVERSIFIED” companies are owned by institutional investors. 16.3% of Utz Brands shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 15.0% of shares of all “FOOD – MISC/DIVERSIFIED” companies are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares Utz Brands and its peers top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Net Income	Price/Earnings Ratio
Utz Brands	$1.41 billion	$15.97 million	41.09
Utz Brands Competitors	$8.21 billion	$408.09 million	23.96

Utz Brands’ peers have higher revenue and earnings than Utz Brands. Utz Brands is trading at a higher price-to-earnings ratio than its peers, indicating that it is currently more expensive than other companies in its industry.

Profitability

This table compares Utz Brands and its peers’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Utz Brands	1.94%	8.05%	4.14%
Utz Brands Competitors	-3.74%	-16.93%	1.89%

Summary

Utz Brands beats its peers on 11 of the 15 factors compared.

About Utz Brands

Utz Brands, Inc. engages in manufacture, marketing, and distribution of snack foods. It offers a range of salty snacks, including salty snacks, including potato chips, tortilla chips, pretzels, cheese snacks, pork skins, veggie snacks, pub/party mixes, tortilla chips, salsa and dips, ready-to-eat popcorn, and other snacks under the Utz, Zapp’s, ON THE BORDER, Golden Flake, Boulder Canyon, Hawaiian, TORTIYAHS!, etc. The company sells its products to wholesale and other distributors, grocery stores, convenience and drug stores, discount stores, mass merchandisers, membership club stores, hard discounters, and specialty and e-commerce retailers. Utz Brands, Inc. was founded in 1921 and is headquartered in Hanover, Pennsylvania.