Critical Review: AngloGold Ashanti (AU) vs. Its Competitors

AngloGold Ashanti (NYSE:AU) is one of 1,984 publicly-traded companies in the “Metals & Mining” industry, but how does it contrast to its competitors? We will compare AngloGold Ashanti to related companies based on the strength of its dividends, risk, analyst recommendations, institutional ownership, valuation, earnings and profitability.

Profitability

This table compares AngloGold Ashanti and its competitors’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
AngloGold Ashanti	32.63%	39.17%	26.23%
AngloGold Ashanti Competitors	-1,164,884,689,320,590,400.00%	-52.92%	-2.03%

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current ratings and price targets for AngloGold Ashanti and its competitors, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
AngloGold Ashanti	0	3	8	3	3.00
AngloGold Ashanti Competitors	6406	22609	32308	1801	2.47

AngloGold Ashanti presently has a consensus price target of $118.35, suggesting a potential upside of 27.31%. As a group, “Metals & Mining” companies have a potential upside of 25.21%. Given AngloGold Ashanti’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, equities analysts clearly believe AngloGold Ashanti is more favorable than its competitors.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares AngloGold Ashanti and its competitors gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Net Income	Price/Earnings Ratio
AngloGold Ashanti	$12.03 billion	$2.64 billion	12.09
AngloGold Ashanti Competitors	$5.23 billion	$278.94 million	-26.23

AngloGold Ashanti has higher revenue and earnings than its competitors. AngloGold Ashanti is trading at a higher price-to-earnings ratio than its competitors, indicating that it is currently more expensive than other companies in its industry.

Volatility and Risk

AngloGold Ashanti has a beta of 0.72, suggesting that its stock price is 28% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, AngloGold Ashanti’s competitors have a beta of 0.96, suggesting that their average stock price is 4% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Dividends

AngloGold Ashanti pays an annual dividend of $0.50 per share and has a dividend yield of 0.5%. AngloGold Ashanti pays out 6.5% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. As a group, “Metals & Mining” companies pay a dividend yield of 10.1% and pay out 10.8% of their earnings in the form of a dividend.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

36.1% of AngloGold Ashanti shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 15.9% of shares of all “Metals & Mining” companies are held by institutional investors. 17.7% of shares of all “Metals & Mining” companies are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Summary

AngloGold Ashanti beats its competitors on 12 of the 15 factors compared.

AngloGold Ashanti Company Profile

AngloGold Ashanti plc operates as a gold mining company in Africa, Australia, and the Americas. The company primarily explores for gold, as well as produces silver and sulphuric acid as by-products. Its flagship property is a 100% owned Geita mine located in the Lake Victoria goldfields of the Mwanza region in north-western Tanzania. AngloGold Ashanti plc was incorporated in 1944 and is headquartered in Greenwood Village, Colorado.