Comparing PPG Industries (NYSE:PPG) & Gulf Resources (NASDAQ:GURE)

PPG Industries (NYSE:PPG) and Gulf Resources (NASDAQ:GURE) are both materials companies, but which is the better stock? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their earnings, dividends, risk, profitability, institutional ownership, valuation and analyst recommendations.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent ratings and target prices for PPG Industries and Gulf Resources, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
PPG Industries	0	9	8	1	2.56
Gulf Resources	1	0	0	0	1.00

PPG Industries presently has a consensus target price of $126.12, suggesting a potential upside of 16.98%. Given PPG Industries’ stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, equities analysts clearly believe PPG Industries is more favorable than Gulf Resources.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

81.9% of PPG Industries shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 3.3% of Gulf Resources shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.3% of PPG Industries shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 7.7% of Gulf Resources shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares PPG Industries and Gulf Resources”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
PPG Industries	$16.42 billion	1.46	$1.58 billion	$6.98	15.45
Gulf Resources	$30.73 million	0.17	-$43.92 million	($29.52)	-0.10

PPG Industries has higher revenue and earnings than Gulf Resources. Gulf Resources is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than PPG Industries, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Risk & Volatility

PPG Industries has a beta of 1.06, indicating that its share price is 6% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Gulf Resources has a beta of -0.02, indicating that its share price is 102% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares PPG Industries and Gulf Resources’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
PPG Industries	9.57%	21.07%	7.80%
Gulf Resources	-134.41%	-8.95%	-7.40%

Summary

PPG Industries beats Gulf Resources on 14 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About PPG Industries

PPG Industries, Inc. manufactures and distributes paints, coatings, and specialty materials in the United States, Canada, the Asia Pacific, Latin America, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. It operates through two segments, Performance Coatings and Industrial Coatings. The Performance Coatings segment offers coatings, solvents, adhesives, sealants, sundries, and software for automotive and commercial transport/fleet repair and refurbishing, light industrial coatings, and specialty coatings for signs; wood stains; paints, thermoplastics, pavement marking products, and other advanced technologies for pavement marking for government, commercial infrastructure, painting, and maintenance contractors; and coatings, sealants, transparencies, transparent armor, adhesives, engineered materials, and packaging and chemical management services for commercial, military, regional jet, and general aviation aircraft. The Industrial Coatings segment offers coatings, adhesives and sealants, and metal pretreatments, as well as services and coatings applications for appliances, agricultural and construction equipment, consumer electronics, automotive parts and accessories, building products, kitchenware, and transportation vehicles and other finished products; and on-site coatings services. It also provides coatings for metal cans, closures, plastic and aluminum tubes for food, beverage and personal care, promotional, and specialty packaging; amorphous precipitated silica for tire, battery separator, and other end-uses; TESLIN substrates for labels, e-passports, drivers' licenses, breathable membranes, and loyalty and identification cards; and organic light emitting diode materials, displays and lighting lens materials, optical lenses, color-change products, and photochromic dyes. PPG Industries, Inc. was incorporated in 1883 and is headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

About Gulf Resources

Gulf Resources, Inc., through its subsidiaries, manufactures and trades bromine and crude salt, chemical products, and natural gas in the People’s Republic of China. The company operates through four segments: Bromine, Crude salt, Chemical products, and Natural gas segments. It also provides bromine for use in bromine compounds, intermediates in organic synthesis, brominated flame retardants, fumigants, water purification compounds, dyes, medicines, and disinfectants. In addition, the company offers crude salt for use as a material in alkali and chlorine alkali production for use in the chemical, food and beverage, and other industries. In addition, it manufactures and sells chemical products for use in oil and gas field exploration, oil and gas distribution, oil field drilling, papermaking chemical agents, and inorganic chemicals, as well as materials that are used for human and animal antibiotics. The company is based in Shouguang, the People’s Republic of China.