Critical Survey: Lithium Americas (Argentina) (NYSE:LAAC) & Anglo American (OTCMKTS:NGLOY)

Anglo American (OTCMKTS:NGLOY) and Lithium Americas (Argentina) (NYSE:LAAC) are both basic materials companies, but which is the superior stock? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, earnings, dividends, institutional ownership, risk, profitability and valuation.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

0.0% of Anglo American shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 49.2% of Lithium Americas (Argentina) shares are owned by institutional investors. 19.8% of Lithium Americas (Argentina) shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Risk & Volatility

Anglo American has a beta of 1.06, indicating that its stock price is 6% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Lithium Americas (Argentina) has a beta of 1.32, indicating that its stock price is 32% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent ratings and price targets for Anglo American and Lithium Americas (Argentina), as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Anglo American	0	3	3	0	2.50
Lithium Americas (Argentina)	0	4	4	1	2.67

Lithium Americas (Argentina) has a consensus target price of $8.21, indicating a potential upside of 230.98%. Given Lithium Americas (Argentina)’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe Lithium Americas (Argentina) is more favorable than Anglo American.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Anglo American and Lithium Americas (Argentina)”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Anglo American	$30.65 billion	1.24	$283.00 million	N/A	N/A
Lithium Americas (Argentina)	N/A	N/A	$1.29 billion	$7.99	0.31

Lithium Americas (Argentina) has lower revenue, but higher earnings than Anglo American.

Profitability

This table compares Anglo American and Lithium Americas (Argentina)’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Anglo American	N/A	N/A	N/A
Lithium Americas (Argentina)	N/A	-0.25%	-0.20%

Summary

Lithium Americas (Argentina) beats Anglo American on 8 of the 11 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Anglo American

Anglo American plc operates as a mining company in the United Kingdom and internationally. It explores for rough and polished diamonds, copper, platinum group metals and nickel, steelmaking coal, and iron ore; and nickel, polyhalite, and manganese ores. Anglo American plc was founded in 1917 and is headquartered in London, the United Kingdom.

About Lithium Americas (Argentina)

Lithium Americas (Argentina) Corp. operates as a resource company. The company explores for lithium deposits. The company owns interests in the Cauchari-Olaroz project located in Jujuy province of Argentina. It also has a pipeline of development and exploration stage projects, including the Pastos Grandes project and the Sal de la Puna project located in Salta Province in northwestern Argentina. Lithium Americas (Argentina) Corp. is headquartered in Vancouver, Canada.