Comparing Repligen (NASDAQ:RGEN) and Exelixis (NASDAQ:EXEL)

Exelixis (NASDAQ:EXEL) and Repligen (NASDAQ:RGEN) are both mid-cap medical companies, but which is the better stock? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their valuation, profitability, dividends, analyst recommendations, institutional ownership, earnings and risk.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of recent ratings and target prices for Exelixis and Repligen, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Exelixis	0	7	10	0	2.59
Repligen	0	2	9	0	2.82

Exelixis currently has a consensus target price of $26.13, indicating a potential upside of 15.85%. Repligen has a consensus target price of $193.00, indicating a potential upside of 52.97%. Given Repligen’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Repligen is more favorable than Exelixis.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares Exelixis and Repligen’s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Exelixis	$1.85 billion	3.70	$207.76 million	$0.64	35.23
Repligen	$638.76 million	11.04	$41.58 million	$0.25	504.70

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

Insider & Institutional Ownership

85.3% of Exelixis shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 97.6% of Repligen shares are held by institutional investors. 2.9% of Exelixis shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 1.2% of Repligen shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Profitability

This table compares Exelixis and Repligen’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Exelixis	11.10%	8.85%	6.91%
Repligen	2.44%	3.95%	2.90%

Risk and Volatility

Exelixis has a beta of 0.54, suggesting that its share price is 46% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Repligen has a beta of 0.95, suggesting that its share price is 5% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Exelixis beats Repligen on 8 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Exelixis

Exelixis, Inc., an oncology company, focuses on the discovery, development, and commercialization of new medicines for difficult-to-treat cancers in the United States. The company offers CABOMETYX tablets for the treatment of patients with advanced renal cell carcinoma who received prior anti-angiogenic therapy; and COMETRIQ capsules for the treatment of progressive and metastatic medullary thyroid cancer. Its CABOMETYX and COMETRIQ are derived from cabozantinib, an inhibitor of multiple tyrosine kinases, including MET, AXL, RET, and VEGF receptors. The company also offers COTELLIC, an inhibitor of MEK as a combination regimen to treat specific forms of advanced melanoma; and MINNEBRO, an oral non-steroidal selective blocker of the mineralocorticoid receptor for the treatment of hypertension in Japan. It develops zanzalintinib, a novel, potent, next-generation oral tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) that targets VEGF receptors, MET and the TAM kinases (TYRO3, AXL and MER); and XB002, a next-generation tissue factor (TF)-targeting ADC, administered via intravenous infusion and composed of a human monoclonal antibody (mAb) against TF that is conjugated to an auristatin-based microtubulin inhibitor (MTI) payload. It has research collaborations and license agreements with Ipsen Pharma SAS; Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Ltd.; F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd.; Redwood Bioscience, Inc.; R.P. Scherer Technologies, LLC; Catalent Pharma Solutions, Inc.; NBE Therapeutics AG; Aurigene Discovery Technologies Limited; Iconic Therapeutics, Inc.; Invenra, Inc.; StemSynergy Therapeutics, Inc.; Genentech, Inc.; Bristol-Myers Squibb Company; and Daiichi Sankyo Company, Limited, as well as clinical development agreement with Sairopa B.V. for ADU-1805. The company was formerly known as Exelixis Pharmaceuticals, Inc. and changed its name to Exelixis, Inc. in February 2000. Exelixis, Inc. was incorporated in 1994 and is headquartered in Alameda, California.

About Repligen

Repligen Corporation develops and commercializes bioprocessing technologies and systems for use in biological drug manufacturing process in North America, Europe, the Asia Pacific, and internationally. It offers Protein A ligands that are the binding components of Protein A affinity chromatography resins; and cell culture growth factor products. The company's chromatography products include OPUS pre-packed chromatography columns, which are used in the purification of biologics; and OPUS smaller-scale columns that are used in the high throughput process development screening, viral clearance validation studies, and scale down validation of chromatography processes. It also offers ELISA test kits; and chromatography resins under the CaptivA brand. In addition, the company provides filtration products, such as XCell Alternating Tangential Flow systems that are filtration devices used in upstream perfusion and cell culture processing; TangenX flat sheet cassettes, which are used in downstream biologic drug concentration, buffer exchange, and formulation processes; KrosFlo tangential flow filtration and tangential flow depth filtration systems; Spectra/Por laboratory and process dialysis products, and ProConnex TFDF flow paths. Further, it provides process analytics products, such as slope spectroscopy systems under the SoloVPE, FlowVPE, and FlowVPX brands. The company sells its products to life sciences, biopharmaceutical, and diagnostics companies; laboratory researchers; and contract manufacturing organizations. Repligen Corporation has collaboration agreements with Navigo Proteins GmbH to develop multiple affinity ligands. The company was incorporated in 1981 and is headquartered in Waltham, Massachusetts.