Financial Review: Ironwood Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:IRWD) & CytoDyn (OTCMKTS:CYDY)

CytoDyn (OTCMKTS:CYDY) and Ironwood Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:IRWD) are both small-cap medical companies, but which is the superior investment? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their valuation, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, profitability, earnings, dividends and risk.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of current ratings and price targets for CytoDyn and Ironwood Pharmaceuticals, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
CytoDyn	0	0	0	0	0.00
Ironwood Pharmaceuticals	1	3	2	2	2.63

Ironwood Pharmaceuticals has a consensus price target of $3.68, indicating a potential downside of 19.41%. Given Ironwood Pharmaceuticals’ stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe Ironwood Pharmaceuticals is more favorable than CytoDyn.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

5.1% of CytoDyn shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.0% of CytoDyn shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 12.7% of Ironwood Pharmaceuticals shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Risk and Volatility

CytoDyn has a beta of 1.13, meaning that its stock price is 13% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Ironwood Pharmaceuticals has a beta of 0.17, meaning that its stock price is 83% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares CytoDyn and Ironwood Pharmaceuticals’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
CytoDyn	N/A	N/A	-175.37%
Ironwood Pharmaceuticals	8.70%	-15.17%	12.93%

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares CytoDyn and Ironwood Pharmaceuticals”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
CytoDyn	N/A	N/A	$3.74 million	($0.03)	-8.30
Ironwood Pharmaceuticals	$351.41 million	2.11	$880,000.00	$0.16	28.50

CytoDyn has higher earnings, but lower revenue than Ironwood Pharmaceuticals. CytoDyn is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Ironwood Pharmaceuticals, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Summary

Ironwood Pharmaceuticals beats CytoDyn on 10 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About CytoDyn

CytoDyn Inc., a clinical-stage biotechnology company, engages in the development of treatments for multiple therapeutic indications. The company is involved in the clinical development of leronlimab, a novel humanized monoclonal antibody targeting the C-C chemokine receptor type 5 receptor in the areas of COVID-19, human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), Metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (MASH), and solid tumors in oncology, such as metastatic triple-negative breast cancer. Its leronlimab is currently under phase 2 development for the treatment of NASH, HIV- NASH, and solid tumors, as well as under pre-clinical development for the treatment of HIV-PrEP and HIV-Cure. The company was formerly known as RexRay Corporation. CytoDyn Inc. was incorporated in 2002 and is based in Vancouver, Washington.

About Ironwood Pharmaceuticals

Ironwood Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a healthcare company, focuses on the development and commercialization of gastrointestinal (GI) products. It markets linaclotide, a guanylate cyclase type-C (GC-C) agonist for the treatment of adults suffering from irritable bowel syndrome with constipation or chronic idiopathic constipation under the LINZESS name in the United States, Mexico, Japan, Saudi Arabia, and China, as well as under the CONSTELLA name in the Canada and European countries. The company is also developing IW-3300, a GC-C agonist for the treatment of visceral pain conditions, including interstitial cystitis/bladder pain syndrome and endometriosis; Apraglutide, a next-generation, long-acting synthetic peptide analog of glucagon-like peptide-2, as a differentiated therapeutic for rare diseases, including short bowel syndrome dependent on parenteral support and acute graft versus host disease; and CNP-104, an immune nanoparticle for the treatment of primary biliary cholangitis. The company has strategic partnerships with AbbVie Inc., AstraZeneca AB, and Astellas Pharma Inc. for the development and commercialization of linaclotide. The company was formerly known as Microbia, Inc. and changed its name to Ironwood Pharmaceuticals, Inc. in April 2008. Ironwood Pharmaceuticals, Inc. was incorporated in 1998 and is headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts.