Critical Contrast: aTyr Pharma (ATYR) vs. Its Rivals

aTyr Pharma (NASDAQ:ATYR) is one of 844 publicly-traded companies in the “Biotechnology” industry, but how does it weigh in compared to its peers? We will compare aTyr Pharma to related businesses based on the strength of its dividends, institutional ownership, earnings, risk, analyst recommendations, profitability and valuation.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares aTyr Pharma and its peers revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Net Income	Price/Earnings Ratio
aTyr Pharma	$190,000.00	-$74.12 million	-0.27
aTyr Pharma Competitors	$691.14 million	$10.43 million	-10.02

aTyr Pharma’s peers have higher revenue and earnings than aTyr Pharma. aTyr Pharma is trading at a higher price-to-earnings ratio than its peers, indicating that it is currently more expensive than other companies in its industry.

Volatility and Risk

aTyr Pharma has a beta of 1.04, meaning that its share price is 4% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, aTyr Pharma’s peers have a beta of 1.14, meaning that their average share price is 14% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

61.7% of aTyr Pharma shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 47.9% of shares of all “Biotechnology” companies are owned by institutional investors. 5.0% of aTyr Pharma shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 13.0% of shares of all “Biotechnology” companies 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 aTyr Pharma and its peers’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
aTyr Pharma	N/A	-95.89%	-69.67%
aTyr Pharma Competitors	-9,046.59%	-199.78%	-30.61%

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of current recommendations and price targets for aTyr Pharma and its peers, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
aTyr Pharma	1	0	1	1	2.67
aTyr Pharma Competitors	9789	15055	45302	1571	2.54

As a group, “Biotechnology” companies have a potential upside of 97.75%. Given aTyr Pharma’s peers higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe aTyr Pharma has less favorable growth aspects than its peers.

Summary

aTyr Pharma peers beat aTyr Pharma on 7 of the 12 factors compared.

aTyr Pharma Company Profile

aTyr Pharma, Inc. engages in the discovery and development of medicines based on novel biological pathways. Its product pipeline includes ATYR1923, ATYR2810, NRP2 mAbs, and AARS-1, DARS-1. The company was founded by Paul Schimmel, Xiang-Lei Yang and Bruce Beutler on September 8, 2005 and is headquartered in San Diego, CA.