Relay Therapeutics (NASDAQ:RLAY – Get Free Report) and Valneva (NASDAQ:VALN – Get Free Report) are both small-cap medical companies, but which is the better stock? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, risk, earnings, profitability, valuation, dividends and institutional ownership.
Risk & Volatility
Relay Therapeutics has a beta of 1.67, indicating that its stock price is 67% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Valneva has a beta of 2.17, indicating that its stock price is 117% more volatile than the S&P 500.
Analyst Ratings
This is a summary of current ratings and target prices for Relay Therapeutics and Valneva, as provided by MarketBeat.
| Sell Ratings | Hold Ratings | Buy Ratings | Strong Buy Ratings | Rating Score | |
| Relay Therapeutics | 0 | 1 | 9 | 0 | 2.90 |
| Valneva | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 3.00 |
Valuation and Earnings
This table compares Relay Therapeutics and Valneva”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.
| Gross Revenue | Price/Sales Ratio | Net Income | Earnings Per Share | Price/Earnings Ratio | |
| Relay Therapeutics | $25.55 million | 33.48 | -$341.97 million | ($2.61) | -1.96 |
| Valneva | $165.52 million | 2.29 | -$109.78 million | ($0.13) | -35.85 |
Valneva has higher revenue and earnings than Relay Therapeutics. Valneva is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Relay Therapeutics, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Profitability
This table compares Relay Therapeutics and Valneva’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.
| Net Margins | Return on Equity | Return on Assets | |
| Relay Therapeutics | N/A | -45.75% | -40.75% |
| Valneva | -4.35% | -3.93% | -1.42% |
Institutional and Insider Ownership
97.0% of Relay Therapeutics shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 11.4% of Valneva shares are held by institutional investors. 4.3% of Relay Therapeutics shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 14.9% of Valneva shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.
Summary
Valneva beats Relay Therapeutics on 8 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.
About Relay Therapeutics
Relay Therapeutics, Inc. operates as a clinical-stage precision medicines company. It engages in transforming the drug discovery process with an initial focus on enhancing small molecule therapeutic discovery in targeted oncology and genetic disease indications. The company’s lead product candidates include RLY-4008, an oral small molecule inhibitor of fibroblast growth factor receptor 2 (FGFR2), which is in a first-in-human clinical trial for patients with advanced or metastatic FGFR2-altered solid tumors; RLY-2608, a lead mutant-PI3Ka inhibitor program that targets phosphoinostide 3 kinase alpha; and Migoprotafib (GDC-1971), an oral, small molecule, potent and selective inhibitor of the protein tyrosine phosphatase SHP2 that binds and stabilizes Src homology region 2 domain-containing phosphatase-2 (SHP2) as a monotherapy in patients with advanced or metastatic solid tumors. In addition, it has collaboration and license agreements with D. E. Shaw Research, LLC to research certain biological targets through the use of D. E. Shaw Research computational modeling capabilities focused on analysis of protein motion to develop and commercialize compounds and products directed to such targets; and Genentech, Inc. for the development and commercialization of GDC-1971. The company was formerly known as Allostery, Inc. and changed its name to Relay Therapeutics, Inc. in December 2015. Relay Therapeutics, Inc. was incorporated in 2015 and is headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
About Valneva
Valneva SE, a specialty vaccine company, develops, manufactures, and commercializes prophylactic vaccines for infectious diseases with unmet needs. It offers IXIARO, an inactivated Vero cell culture-derived Japanese encephalitis vaccine indicated for active immunization against Japanese encephalitis; DUKORAL, an oral vaccine for the prevention of diarrhea caused by Vibrio cholera and/or heat-labile toxin producing enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli bacterium; IXCHIQ, a single-dose, live-attenuated vaccine for the prevention of disease caused by chikungunya virus; and VLA2001, an inactivated whole-virus COVID-19 vaccine. The company also develops VLA15, a vaccine candidate, which is in Phase III clinical trial against Borrelia, the bacterium that causes Lyme disease; VLA1553, a vaccine candidate, which is in Phase III clinical trial against the chikungunya virus; VLA1554, a vaccine candidate targeting human metapneumovirus; and VLA2112, a vaccine candidate to treat patients with epstein-barr virus. It sells its products in the United States, Canada, Germany, Austria, Nordics, the United Kingdom, France, rest of European countries, and internationally. Valneva SE has collaborations with Pfizer, Inc. to co-develop and commercialize its Lyme disease vaccine; and Instituto Butantan for the development, manufacturing, and marketing of single-shot chikungunya vaccine. The company was founded in 1998 and is based in Saint-Herblain, France.
Receive News & Ratings for Relay Therapeutics Daily - Enter your email address below to receive a concise daily summary of the latest news and analysts' ratings for Relay Therapeutics and related companies with MarketBeat.com's FREE daily email newsletter.
