Synergy CHC (NASDAQ:SNYR) & Church & Dwight (NYSE:CHD) Critical Review

Church & Dwight (NYSE:CHD) and Synergy CHC (NASDAQ:SNYR) are both consumer staples companies, but which is the superior investment? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their dividends, analyst recommendations, earnings, institutional ownership, valuation, profitability and risk.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current recommendations and price targets for Church & Dwight and Synergy CHC, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Church & Dwight	4	7	10	0	2.29
Synergy CHC	0	1	1	0	2.50

Church & Dwight currently has a consensus target price of $98.65, indicating a potential upside of 6.63%. Synergy CHC has a consensus target price of $7.00, indicating a potential upside of 243.14%. Given Synergy CHC’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Synergy CHC is more favorable than Church & Dwight.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

86.6% of Church & Dwight shares are held by institutional investors. 1.2% of Church & Dwight shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 56.6% of Synergy CHC shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Profitability

This table compares Church & Dwight and Synergy CHC’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Church & Dwight	12.74%	19.32%	9.47%
Synergy CHC	7.77%	-19.51%	14.25%

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Church & Dwight and Synergy CHC”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Church & Dwight	$6.11 billion	3.64	$585.30 million	$3.18	29.09
Synergy CHC	$34.83 million	0.66	$2.12 million	$0.29	7.03

Church & Dwight has higher revenue and earnings than Synergy CHC. Synergy CHC is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Church & Dwight, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Volatility and Risk

Church & Dwight has a beta of 0.46, suggesting that its stock price is 54% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Synergy CHC has a beta of 3.48, suggesting that its stock price is 248% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Church & Dwight beats Synergy CHC on 9 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Church & Dwight

Church & Dwight Co., Inc. engages in the development, manufacture, and marketing of household, personal care, and specialty products. It operates through the following segments: Consumer Domestic, Consumer International, Specialty Products Division (SPD), and Corporate. The Consumer Domestic segment offers household products, such as laundry detergents, fabric softener sheets, cat litter, household cleaning products, and personal care products including antiperspirants, oral care products, depilatories, reproductive health products, oral analgesics, nasal saline moisturizers, and dietary supplements. The Consumer International segment is involved in the personal care, household and over-the-counter products in international subsidiary markets, including Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, Mexico, China, and the United Kingdom. The SPD segment consists of sales to businesses and participates in three product areas namely, animal nutrition, specialty chemicals, and commercial and professional. The Corporate segment includes equity in earnings of affiliates. The company was founded by Dwight John and Austin Church in 1846 and is headquartered in Ewing, NJ.

About Synergy CHC

Synergy CHC Corp. engages in the marketing and distribution of branded health and wellness products. The company was founded on December 29, 2010 and is headquartered in Westbrook, ME.