Altria vs. Philip Morris: Which Is Better?

Altria vs. Philip Morris: Which Is Better?

LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND - MARCH 3, 2020: The headquarters of the Philip Morris International cigarette ... [+] and tobacco manufacturing company. Valery Sharifulin/TASS (Photo by Valery SharifulinTASS via Getty Images)



Valery Sharifulin/TASS



Altria stock (NYSE: MO) price has decreased by about 29% in the last three and a half years, when the stock dropped from $56 at the end of 2016 to around $40 as of 25th June 2020. That's bad news for Altria. But wait a minute, close rival Philip Morris stock (NYSE: PM) price has seen only an 8% drop during the same period. This suggests Altria's stock price loss was 3.6x PM's stock loss. This is despite the fact that Altria's net income margins have largely been higher than Philip Morris' margins over recent years (except in 2019). Does the stock price movement then make sense? We believe it does and our dashboard Altria vs. Philip Morris: Does The Stock Price Movement Make Sense? has the underlying numbers.













Sure, Altria's margins were historically higher but they have continuously declined during the 2016-2019 period. Altria's margins were unusually high at 55% in 2016 due to one-time gain on the SABMiller business combination,