Pentair (NYSE:PNR) & Oshkosh (NYSE:OSK) Head-To-Head Review

Oshkosh (NYSE:OSK) and Pentair (NYSE:PNR) are both mid-cap industrials companies, but which is the superior investment? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their profitability, valuation, dividends, earnings, risk, analyst recommendations and institutional ownership.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

92.4% of Oshkosh shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 92.4% of Pentair shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.6% of Oshkosh shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 1.3% of Pentair shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Dividends

Oshkosh pays an annual dividend of $2.28 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.7%. Pentair pays an annual dividend of $1.08 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.0%. Oshkosh pays out 26.1% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Pentair pays out 27.1% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Both companies have healthy payout ratios and should be able to cover their dividend payments with earnings for the next several years. Oshkosh has raised its dividend for 13 consecutive years and Pentair has raised its dividend for 7 consecutive years.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Oshkosh and Pentair”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Oshkosh	$10.42 billion	0.79	$647.00 million	$8.74	15.24
Pentair	$4.18 billion	2.11	$653.80 million	$3.98	13.88

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

Risk and Volatility

Oshkosh has a beta of 1.26, suggesting that its share price is 26% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Pentair has a beta of 1.04, suggesting that its share price is 4% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent ratings and recommmendations for Oshkosh and Pentair, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Oshkosh	1	5	11	0	2.59
Pentair	3	6	7	1	2.35

Oshkosh currently has a consensus target price of $165.79, suggesting a potential upside of 24.44%. Pentair has a consensus target price of $76.19, suggesting a potential upside of 37.94%. Given Pentair’s higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Pentair is more favorable than Oshkosh.

Profitability

This table compares Oshkosh and Pentair’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Oshkosh	5.24%	12.95%	5.86%
Pentair	16.24%	20.62%	11.44%

Summary

Pentair beats Oshkosh on 10 of the 18 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Oshkosh

Oshkosh Corporation provides purpose-built vehicles and equipment worldwide. The company operates through three segments: Access, Defense, and Vocational segment. Its Access Equipment segment design and manufacture aerial work platform and telehandlers for use in construction, industrial, and maintenance applications; offers financing and leasing solutions including rental fleet loans, leases, and floor plan and retail financing; and towing and recovery equipment, which includes carriers, wreckers, and rotators, as well as provides equipment installation and sale of chassis and service parts. The Defense segment engages in the manufacture and sale of heavy, medium, and light tactical wheeled vehicles and related services for department of defense. Its Vocational segment offers custom and commercial firefighting equipment, fire apparatus, and emergency vehicles, including pumpers, aerial platform, ladder and tiller trucks, and tankers; light, medium, and heavy-duty rescue vehicles; and wildland rough terrain response, bomb squad, hazardous materials control vehicles, mobile command and control centers, and other emergency response vehicles. Additionally, this segment produces and sells custom and commercial firefighting vehicles, as well as command vehicles, ARFF vehicles; design and manufacture refuse collection vehicles for waste services industry; front discharge concrete mixers for the concrete ready-mix industry; and field service vehicles and truck-mounted cranes for construction, equipment dealer, building supply, utility, tire service, railroad, and mining industries. Further, the company provides its products through direct sales representatives, dealers, and distributors. Oshkosh Corporation was formerly known as Oshkosh Truck Corporation. The company was founded in 1917 and is headquartered in Oshkosh, Wisconsin.

About Pentair

Pentair plc provides various water solutions in the United States, Western Europe, China, Eastern Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Australia, Canada, and Japan. The company operates through three segments: Flow, Water Solutions, and Pool. The Flow segment designs, manufactures, and sells fluid treatment and pump products and systems, including pressure vessels, gas recovery solutions, membrane bioreactors, wastewater reuse systems and advanced membrane filtration, separation systems, water disposal pumps, water supply pumps, fluid transfer pumps, turbine pumps, solid handling pumps, and agricultural spray nozzles for fluid delivery, ion exchange, desalination, food and beverage, separation technologies in the oil and gas industry, residential and municipal wells, water treatment, wastewater solids handling, pressure boosting, circulation and transfer, fire suppression, flood control, agricultural irrigation, and crop spray in residential, commercial, and industrial markets. The Water Solutions segment provides commercial and residential water treatment products and systems, including pressure tanks, control valves, activated carbon products, commercial ice machines, conventional filtration products, and point-of-entry and point-of-use water treatment systems, as well as installation and preventative services for use in residential whole home water filtration, drinking water filtration, and water softening solutions, as well as commercial total water management and filtration in foodservice operations. The Pool segment provides residential and commercial pool equipment and accessories comprising pumps, filters, heaters, lights, automatic controls, automatic cleaners, maintenance equipment, and pool accessories for applications in residential and commercial pool maintenance, pool repair, renovation, service, and construction and aquaculture solutions. Pentair plc was founded in 1966 and is headquartered in London, the United Kingdom.