Kadant (KAI) Competitors

IDEX (NYSE:IEX) and Kadant (NYSE:KAI) are both industrial products companies, but which is the better stock? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their media sentiment, valuation, community ranking, analyst recommendations, institutional ownership, dividends, profitability, earnings and risk.

Is IEX or KAI more profitable?

IDEX has a net margin of 15.35% compared to Kadant's net margin of 11.12%. IDEX's return on equity of 15.92% beat Kadant's return on equity.

Company	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
IDEX	15.35%	15.92%	9.46%
Kadant	11.12%	15.10%	8.88%

Do analysts rate IEX or KAI?

IDEX presently has a consensus price target of $243.14, indicating a potential upside of 14.48%. Kadant has a consensus price target of $355.00, indicating a potential upside of 2.28%. Given IDEX's stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities analysts plainly believe IDEX is more favorable than Kadant.

Company	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
IDEX	0 Sell rating(s)	2 Hold rating(s)	6 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.75
Kadant	0 Sell rating(s)	1 Hold rating(s)	2 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.67

Is IEX or KAI a better dividend stock?

IDEX pays an annual dividend of $2.76 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.3%. Kadant pays an annual dividend of $1.28 per share and has a dividend yield of 0.4%. IDEX pays out 42.7% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Kadant pays out 13.1% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Both companies have healthy payout ratios and should be able to cover their dividend payments with earnings for the next several years.

Do insiders and institutionals hold more shares of IEX or KAI?

98.0% of IDEX shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 96.1% of Kadant shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.5% of IDEX shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 1.4% of Kadant shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Which has more volatility and risk, IEX or KAI?

IDEX has a beta of 0.96, meaning that its share price is 4% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Kadant has a beta of 1.25, meaning that its share price is 25% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Does the media prefer IEX or KAI?

In the previous week, Kadant had 16 more articles in the media than IDEX. MarketBeat recorded 19 mentions for Kadant and 3 mentions for IDEX. Kadant's average media sentiment score of 1.09 beat IDEX's score of 1.07 indicating that Kadant is being referred to more favorably in the news media.

Company	Very Positive	Positive	Neutral	Negative	Very Negative	Overall Sentiment
IDEX	2 Very Positive mention(s)	0 Positive mention(s)	0 Neutral mention(s)	1 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Positive
Kadant	7 Very Positive mention(s)	3 Positive mention(s)	2 Neutral mention(s)	0 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Positive

Which has better valuation and earnings, IEX or KAI?

IDEX has higher revenue and earnings than Kadant. IDEX is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Kadant, 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
IDEX	$3.19B	5.03	$596.10M	$6.46	32.88
Kadant	$1.03B	3.94	$116.07M	$9.77	35.52

Does the MarketBeat Community favor IEX or KAI?

IDEX received 155 more outperform votes than Kadant when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 58.75% of users gave IDEX an outperform vote while only 58.12% of users gave Kadant an outperform vote.

Company	Underperform	Outperform
IDEX	Outperform Votes 470 58.75%	Underperform Votes 330 41.25%
Kadant	Outperform Votes 315 58.12%	Underperform Votes 227 41.88%

Summary

IDEX beats Kadant on 13 of the 20 factors compared between the two stocks.