AeroVironment (NASDAQ:AVAV) vs. Saab (OTCMKTS:SAABY) Head to Head Survey

AeroVironment (NASDAQ:AVAV) and Saab (OTCMKTS:SAABY) are both large-cap aerospace companies, but which is the superior investment? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, earnings, institutional ownership, valuation, profitability, risk and dividends.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current ratings for AeroVironment and Saab, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
AeroVironment	0	0	15	3	3.17
Saab	1	1	0	1	2.33

AeroVironment currently has a consensus target price of $283.5455, indicating a potential upside of 9.22%. Given AeroVironment’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities analysts plainly believe AeroVironment is more favorable than Saab.

Risk and Volatility

AeroVironment has a beta of 0.99, meaning that its share price is 1% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Saab has a beta of -0.02, meaning that its share price is 102% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

86.4% of AeroVironment shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.3% of AeroVironment shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Profitability

This table compares AeroVironment and Saab’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
AeroVironment	5.32%	10.68%	8.80%
Saab	7.45%	13.82%	5.19%

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares AeroVironment and Saab”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
AeroVironment	$820.63 million	15.61	$43.62 million	$1.55	167.49
Saab	$6.03 billion	4.83	$394.58 million	$0.61	44.57

Saab has higher revenue and earnings than AeroVironment. Saab is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than AeroVironment, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Summary

AeroVironment beats Saab on 11 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About AeroVironment

AeroVironment, Inc. designs, develops, produces, delivers, and supports a portfolio of robotic systems and related services for government agencies and businesses in the United States and internationally. It operates through Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems (SUAS), Tactical Missile System (TMS), Medium Unmanned Aircraft Systems (MUAS), and High Altitude Pseudo-Satellite Systems (HAPS) segments. The company supplies UAS, TMS, unmanned ground vehicle, and related services primarily to organizations within the U.S. Department of Defense, other federal agencies, and to international allied governments. It also designs, engineers, tools, and manufactures unmanned aerial and aircraft systems, including airborne platforms, payloads and payload integration, ground control systems, and ground support equipment and other items and services related to unmanned aircraft systems. In addition, the company offers small UAS products, including training, spare parts, product repair, product replacement, and the customer contracted operation. Further, it develops high-altitude pseudo-satellite UAS systems. AeroVironment, Inc. was incorporated in 1971 and is headquartered in Arlington, Virginia.

About Saab

Saab AB (publ) provides products, services, and solutions for military defense, aviation, and civil security markets worldwide. The company operates through Aeronautics, Dynamics, Surveillance, Kockums, and Combitech segments. The company develops military aviation technology, as well as conducts studies on manned and unmanned aircraft. It also provides ground combat weapons, missile systems, torpedoes, unmanned underwater vehicles, training and simulation systems, and signature management systems for armed forces; and niche products for the civil and defense market, such as underwater vehicles for the offshore industry. In addition, the company offers solutions for safety and security, surveillance and decision support, and threat detection, location, and protection, including airborne, ground-based and naval radar, electronic warfare, and combat systems, as well as C4I solutions. Additionally, it provides submarines with the Stirling system for air independent propulsion, surface combatants, mine hunting systems, and autonomous vessels; and systems development, systems integration, information security, systems security, communications, mechanics, and technical product information and logistics. Saab AB (publ) was incorporated in 1937 and is headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden.