Coherent (COHR) Competitors

Coherent (NYSE:COHR) and Cognex (NASDAQ:CGNX) are both business services companies, but which is the superior stock? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their earnings, risk, community ranking, profitability, media sentiment, valuation, analyst recommendations, dividends and institutional ownership.

Does the MarketBeat Community favor COHR or CGNX?

Coherent received 40 more outperform votes than Cognex when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 62.74% of users gave Coherent an outperform vote while only 60.28% of users gave Cognex an outperform vote.

Company	Underperform	Outperform
Coherent	Outperform Votes 559 62.74%	Underperform Votes 332 37.26%
Cognex	Outperform Votes 519 60.28%	Underperform Votes 342 39.72%

Do insiders & institutionals believe in COHR or CGNX?

83.3% of Coherent shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 88.1% of Cognex shares are held by institutional investors. 0.6% of Coherent shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 1.3% of Cognex shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Is COHR or CGNX more profitable?

Cognex has a net margin of 10.10% compared to Coherent's net margin of -1.25%. Coherent's return on equity of 6.63% beat Cognex's return on equity.

Company	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Coherent	-1.25%	6.63%	2.61%
Cognex	10.10%	5.28%	3.96%

Do analysts recommend COHR or CGNX?

Coherent presently has a consensus price target of $99.79, suggesting a potential downside of 3.44%. Cognex has a consensus price target of $47.91, suggesting a potential upside of 22.69%. Given Cognex's higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Cognex is more favorable than Coherent.

Company	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Coherent	0 Sell rating(s)	4 Hold rating(s)	10 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.71
Cognex	1 Sell rating(s)	4 Hold rating(s)	6 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.45

Which has more risk and volatility, COHR or CGNX?

Coherent has a beta of 1.65, suggesting that its stock price is 65% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Cognex has a beta of 1.4, suggesting that its stock price is 40% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Does the media prefer COHR or CGNX?

In the previous week, Coherent had 4 more articles in the media than Cognex. MarketBeat recorded 9 mentions for Coherent and 5 mentions for Cognex. Cognex's average media sentiment score of 1.63 beat Coherent's score of 0.30 indicating that Cognex is being referred to more favorably in the news media.

Company	Very Positive	Positive	Neutral	Negative	Very Negative	Overall Sentiment
Coherent	1 Very Positive mention(s)	3 Positive mention(s)	4 Neutral mention(s)	0 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Neutral
Cognex	5 Very Positive mention(s)	0 Positive mention(s)	0 Neutral mention(s)	0 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Very Positive

Which has better earnings & valuation, COHR or CGNX?

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

Company	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Coherent	$4.71B	3.39	-$156.15M	-$1.23	-84.02
Cognex	$837.55M	8.00	$113.23M	$0.52	75.10

Summary

Cognex beats Coherent on 10 of the 18 factors compared between the two stocks.