Comparing Adagene (NASDAQ:ADAG) & Pliant Therapeutics (NASDAQ:PLRX)

Pliant Therapeutics (NASDAQ:PLRX) and Adagene (NASDAQ:ADAG) are both small-cap healthcare companies, but which is the better business? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their risk, profitability, earnings, dividends, analyst recommendations, valuation and institutional ownership.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent recommendations for Pliant Therapeutics and Adagene, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Pliant Therapeutics	2	1	1	0	1.75
Adagene	1	0	1	1	2.67

Pliant Therapeutics currently has a consensus price target of $3.00, indicating a potential upside of 170.27%. Adagene has a consensus price target of $10.00, indicating a potential upside of 171.74%. Given Adagene’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe Adagene is more favorable than Pliant Therapeutics.

Volatility and Risk

Pliant Therapeutics has a beta of 1.24, meaning that its share price is 24% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Adagene has a beta of 0.58, meaning that its share price is 42% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares Pliant Therapeutics and Adagene’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Pliant Therapeutics	N/A	-52.17%	-40.46%
Adagene	N/A	N/A	N/A

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Pliant Therapeutics and Adagene”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Pliant Therapeutics	$1.58 million	43.50	-$149.34 million	($1.49)	-0.74
Adagene	$7.67 million	22.74	-$17.61 million	N/A	N/A

Adagene has higher revenue and earnings than Pliant Therapeutics.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

97.3% of Pliant Therapeutics shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 9.5% of Adagene shares are owned by institutional investors. 8.7% of Pliant Therapeutics shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 21.2% of Adagene shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Summary

Adagene beats Pliant Therapeutics on 8 of the 11 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Pliant Therapeutics

Pliant Therapeutics, Inc., a clinical stage biopharmaceutical company, discovers, develops, and commercializes novel therapies for the treatment of fibrosis and related diseases in the United States. The company's lead candidate is bexotegrast, an oral, small-molecule, dual selective inhibitor of avß6 and avß1 integrins, which is in phase 2b trials for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis and in phase 2a trial for primary sclerosing cholangitis. It also develops PLN-1474, an oral, small-molecule selective inhibitor of avß1 for the treatment of liver fibrosis associated with nonalcoholic steatohepatitis; PLN-101095, a dual inhibitor of integrins avß8 and avß1 for the treatment of solid tumors; and PLN-101325 for treatment of muscular dystrophies. Pliant Therapeutics, Inc. was incorporated in 2015 and is based in South San Francisco, California.

About Adagene

Adagene Inc., a clinical stage biotechnology company, engages in the research, development, and production of monoclonal antibody drugs for cancers. The company's product candidates include ADG106, a human ligand-blocking agonistic anti- CD137 IgG4 monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) that is in Phase 1b/2 clinical trials for the treatment advanced solid tumors and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma; ADG126, a masked fully-human anti-CTLA-4 mAb that is in Phase 1 clinical trial for the treatment advanced/metastatic solid tumors; and ADG116, a human ligand-blocking anti-CTLA-4 mAb, which is in Phase 1b/2 clinical development for the treatment of advanced/metastatic solid tumors. It also offers ADG104, an anti-PD-L1 mAb that is in Phase 2 clinical development; ADG125, a novel anti-CSF-1R mAb, which is in Phase I clinical trial; ADG206, a masked, Fc engineered anti-CD137 agonistic POWERbody; ADG153, a masked anti-CD47 IgG1 SAFEbody, which is in preclinical for the treatment hematologic and solid tumors; ADG138, novel HER2xCD3 POWERbody, which is in preclinical for the treatment HER2-expressing solid tumors; and ADG152, a v POWERbody, which is in preclinical stage for the treatment off-tumor toxicities, as well as develops anti-CD28 bispecific POWERbody TCEs. The company was incorporated in 2011 and is headquartered in Suzhou, China.