Head to Head Comparison: Bio-Techne (NASDAQ:TECH) versus Prime Medicine (NYSE:PRME)

Prime Medicine (NYSE:PRME) and Bio-Techne (NASDAQ:TECH) are both medical companies, but which is the superior stock? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their profitability, valuation, earnings, analyst recommendations, dividends, institutional ownership and risk.

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of recent ratings for Prime Medicine and Bio-Techne, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Prime Medicine	0	0	9	1	3.10
Bio-Techne	0	4	4	0	2.50

Prime Medicine presently has a consensus price target of $13.13, suggesting a potential upside of 352.59%. Bio-Techne has a consensus price target of $84.29, suggesting a potential upside of 28.56%. Given Prime Medicine’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities analysts clearly believe Prime Medicine is more favorable than Bio-Techne.

Dividends

Prime Medicine pays an annual dividend of $1.45 per share and has a dividend yield of 49.9%. Bio-Techne pays an annual dividend of $0.32 per share and has a dividend yield of 0.5%. Prime Medicine pays out -70.5% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Bio-Techne pays out 32.3% 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. Prime Medicine is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares Prime Medicine and Bio-Techne”s gross revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Prime Medicine	$800,000.00	475.46	-$198.13 million	($2.05)	-1.41
Bio-Techne	$1.20 billion	8.67	$168.10 million	$0.99	66.22

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

Profitability

This table compares Prime Medicine and Bio-Techne’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Prime Medicine	N/A	-107.87%	-74.97%
Bio-Techne	13.22%	12.73%	9.75%

Volatility and Risk

Prime Medicine has a beta of 1.86, meaning that its stock price is 86% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Bio-Techne has a beta of 1.27, meaning that its stock price is 27% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

70.4% of Prime Medicine shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 98.9% of Bio-Techne shares are owned by institutional investors. 23.5% of Prime Medicine shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 3.9% of Bio-Techne 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.

Summary

Prime Medicine beats Bio-Techne on 9 of the 17 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Prime Medicine

Prime Medicine, Inc., a biotechnology company, delivers genetic therapies to address the spectrum of diseases by deploying gene editing technology. The company offers Prime Editors with a Prime Editor protein, comprising a fusion between a Cas protein and a reverse transcriptase enzyme; and a pegRNA, which targets the Prime Editor to a specific genomic location and provides a template for making the desired edit to the target DNA sequence. It has a research collaboration with Cimeio Therapeutics to develop Prime Edited Shielded-Cell & Immunotherapy Pairs for genetic diseases, acute myeloid leukemia, and myelodysplastic syndrome. The company was incorporated in 2019 and is based in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

About Bio-Techne

Bio-Techne Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, develops, manufactures, and sells life science reagents, instruments, and services for the research and clinical diagnostic markets in the United States, the United Kingdom, rest of Europe, Middle East, and Africa, Greater China, rest of Asia-Pacific, and internationally. The company operates through two segments, Protein Sciences, and Diagnostics and Genomics. The Protein Sciences segment develops and manufactures biological reagents used in various aspects of life science research, diagnostics, and cell and gene therapy, such as cytokines and growth factors, antibodies, small molecules, tissue culture sera, and cell selection technologies. This segment also offers proteomic analytical tools for automated western blot and multiplexed ELISA workflow consists of manual and automated protein analysis instruments and immunoassays for use in quantifying proteins in various biological fluids. The Diagnostics and Genomics segment develops and manufactures diagnostic products, including controls, calibrators, and diagnostic assays for regulated diagnostics market, exosome-based molecular diagnostic assays, advanced tissue-based in-situ hybridization assays for spatial genomic and tissue biopsy analysis, and genetic and oncology kits for research and clinical applications; and sells products for genetic carrier screening, oncology diagnostics, molecular controls, and research, as well as instruments and process control products for hematology, blood chemistry and gases, and coagulation controls and reagents used in various diagnostic applications. The company was formerly known as Techne Corporation and changed its name to Bio-Techne Corporation in November 2014. Bio-Techne Corporation was incorporated in 1976 and is headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota.