Head to Head Analysis: Anthem (NASDAQ:ANTX) and Vaccinex (NASDAQ:VCNX)

Anthem (NASDAQ:ANTX) and Vaccinex (NASDAQ:VCNX) are both small-cap medical companies, but which is the superior investment? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their valuation, profitability, earnings, risk, analyst recommendations, institutional ownership and dividends.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

90.5% of Anthem shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 50.1% of Vaccinex shares are owned by institutional investors. 24.5% of Anthem shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 51.5% of Vaccinex shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Profitability

This table compares Anthem and Vaccinex’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Anthem	N/A	-55.04%	-49.13%
Vaccinex	N/A	N/A	-383.58%

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current ratings and price targets for Anthem and Vaccinex, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Anthem	1	0	1	0	2.00
Vaccinex	0	0	0	0	0.00

Anthem currently has a consensus price target of $2.00, indicating a potential downside of 36.31%. Given Anthem’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities research analysts plainly believe Anthem is more favorable than Vaccinex.

Risk and Volatility

Anthem has a beta of -1.31, meaning that its share price is 231% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Vaccinex has a beta of 1.1, meaning that its share price is 10% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares Anthem and Vaccinex”s gross revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Anthem	N/A	N/A	-$35.17 million	($1.16)	-2.71
Vaccinex	$388,000.00	7.80	-$20.25 million	($48.27)	-0.02

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

About Anthem

Anthem, Inc., through its subsidiaries, operates as a health benefits company in the United States. It operates through three segments: Commercial & Specialty Business, Government Business, and Other. The company offers a spectrum of network-based managed care health benefit plans to large and small group, individual, Medicaid, and Medicare markets. Its managed care plans include preferred provider organizations; health maintenance organizations; point-of-service plans; traditional indemnity plans and other hybrid plans, such as consumer-driven health plans; and hospital only and limited benefit products. The company also provides a range of managed care services to self-funded customers, including claims processing, underwriting, stop loss insurance, actuarial services, provider network access, medical cost management, disease management, wellness programs, and other administrative services. In addition, it offers an array of specialty and other insurance products and services, such as dental, vision, life and disability insurance benefits, radiology benefit management, and analytics-driven personal health care guidance; and Medicare administrative services. Further, the company provides services to the federal government in connection with the Federal Employee Program; and operates as a licensee of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association. As of December 31, 2017, it served 40.2 million medical members through its affiliated health plans. The company was formerly known as WellPoint, Inc. and changed its name to Anthem, Inc. in December 2014. Anthem, Inc. was founded in 1944 and is headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana.

About Vaccinex

Vaccinex, Inc., a clinical-stage biotechnology company, engages in the discovery and development of targeted biotherapeutics to treat cancer, neurodegenerative diseases, and autoimmune disorders. The company's lead drug candidate, pepinemab, a humanized monoclonal antibody that binds and blocks the activity of SEMA4D. It is developing Pepinemab, which is in phase 2 study for treatment of Alzheimer's disease and has completed phase 2 study for treatment of Huntington's disease; Pepinemab in combination with Pembrolizumab in phase 2 study for head and neck cancer, Avelumab in phase 2 study for pancreatic cancer, and completed phase 2 study with Avelumab for non-small cell lung cancer; and Pepinemab in combination with Nivolumab completed phase 2 study for melanoma, and trastuzumab and DC vaccine in phase 2 study for breast cancer. The company has also developed ActivMAb, an antibody drug discovery platform based on a novel method for complex targets, such as multi-pass membrane receptors or large and diverse libraries of full-length human monoclonal antibodies on the surface of pox viruses. It has collaborations with Merck Sharp & Dohme; Ares Trading S.A.; The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia; Emory University; Huntington Study Group; H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute, Inc; Catalent Pharma Solutions, LLC; Surface Oncology, Inc.; and Pharmaceutical and Biotech Co. The company was incorporated in 2001 and is headquartered in Rochester, New York.