Pliant Therapeutics (NASDAQ:PLRX) versus CARGO Therapeutics (NASDAQ:CRGX) Head to Head Contrast

Pliant Therapeutics (NASDAQ:PLRX) and CARGO Therapeutics (NASDAQ:CRGX) are both small-cap medical companies, but which is the better business? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their profitability, dividends, institutional ownership, earnings, valuation, risk and analyst recommendations.

Profitability

This table compares Pliant Therapeutics and CARGO Therapeutics’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Pliant Therapeutics	N/A	-73.45%	-55.66%
CARGO Therapeutics	N/A	-43.21%	-37.26%

Institutional & Insider Ownership

97.3% of Pliant Therapeutics shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 93.2% of CARGO Therapeutics shares are owned by institutional investors. 6.4% of Pliant Therapeutics shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 2.9% of CARGO Therapeutics shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent recommendations for Pliant Therapeutics and CARGO Therapeutics, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Pliant Therapeutics	0	12	1	0	2.08
CARGO Therapeutics	1	6	0	0	1.86

Pliant Therapeutics presently has a consensus target price of $8.1875, indicating a potential upside of 387.35%. CARGO Therapeutics has a consensus target price of $15.40, indicating a potential upside of 245.29%. Given Pliant Therapeutics’ stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, equities research analysts clearly believe Pliant Therapeutics is more favorable than CARGO Therapeutics.

Volatility and Risk

Pliant Therapeutics has a beta of 1.42, meaning that its share price is 42% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, CARGO Therapeutics has a beta of 0.3, meaning that its share price is 70% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Pliant Therapeutics and CARGO Therapeutics”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Pliant Therapeutics	$1.58 million	65.28	-$210.30 million	($3.40)	-0.49
CARGO Therapeutics	N/A	N/A	-$167.50 million	($4.64)	-0.96

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

Summary

Pliant Therapeutics beats CARGO Therapeutics on 9 of the 12 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Pliant Therapeutics

Pliant Therapeutics, Inc., a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company, discovers, develops, and commercializes novel therapies for the treatment of fibrosis and related diseases in the United States. The company's lead candidate is bexotegrast, an oral, small-molecule, dual selective inhibitor of avß6 and avß1 integrins, which is in phase 2b trials for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis and in phase 2a trial for primary sclerosing cholangitis. It also develops PLN-1474, an oral, small-molecule selective inhibitor of avß1 for the treatment of liver fibrosis associated with nonalcoholic steatohepatitis; PLN-101095, a dual inhibitor of integrins avß8 and avß1 for the treatment of solid tumors; and PLN-101325 for treatment of muscular dystrophies. Pliant Therapeutics, Inc. was incorporated in 2015 and is based in South San Francisco, California.

About CARGO Therapeutics

CARGO Therapeutics, Inc., a clinical-stage biotechnology company, develops chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapies for cancer patients. The company's lead program is CRG-022, an autologous CD22 CAR T-cell product candidate designed to address resistance mechanisms by targeting CD22, an alternate tumor antigen that is expressed in B-cell malignancies. It also develops CRG-023, a tri-specific CAR T product candidate that targets tumor cells with three B-cell antigen targets. The company was formerly known as Syncopation Life Sciences, Inc. and changed its name to CARGO Therapeutics, Inc. in September 2022. CARGO Therapeutics, Inc. was incorporated in 2019 and is headquartered in San Mateo, California.