Comparing Kineta (NASDAQ:KA) and Arcus Biosciences (NYSE:RCUS)

Kineta (NASDAQ:KA) and Arcus Biosciences (NYSE:RCUS) are both small-cap medical companies, but which is the superior stock? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their risk, earnings, dividends, institutional ownership, valuation, profitability and analyst recommendations.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current ratings and target prices for Kineta and Arcus Biosciences, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Kineta	0	0	1	0	3.00
Arcus Biosciences	0	0	7	1	3.13

Kineta currently has a consensus price target of $8.00, indicating a potential upside of 863.86%. Arcus Biosciences has a consensus price target of $35.71, indicating a potential upside of 113.47%. Given Kineta’s higher probable upside, equities research analysts plainly believe Kineta is more favorable than Arcus Biosciences.

Volatility & Risk

Kineta has a beta of 0.46, meaning that its stock price is 54% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Arcus Biosciences has a beta of 0.9, meaning that its stock price is 10% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Kineta and Arcus Biosciences”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Kineta	$5.44 million	1.87	-$14.10 million	($1.50)	-0.55
Arcus Biosciences	$117.00 million	13.07	-$307.00 million	($3.11)	-5.38

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

Profitability

This table compares Kineta and Arcus Biosciences’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Kineta	N/A	-1,044.95%	-336.46%
Arcus Biosciences	-100.81%	-42.86%	-20.90%

Institutional & Insider Ownership

30.3% of Kineta shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 92.9% of Arcus Biosciences shares are owned by institutional investors. 23.7% of Kineta shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 12.3% of Arcus Biosciences shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Summary

Arcus Biosciences beats Kineta on 9 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Kineta

Kineta, Inc. is a clinical-stage biotechnology company with a focus on developing immunotherapies that transform patients' lives. It focuses on developing potentially differentiated immunotherapies that address the challenges with current cancer therapy. The company's immuno-oncology pipeline includes KVA12123, a VISTA blocking immunotherapy in development as a twice weekly monoclonal antibody (mAb) infusion drug. KVA12123 is being evaluated in a Phase 1/2 clinical trial as a monotherapy and in combination with pembrolizumab in patients with advanced solid tumors, including non-small cell lung, ovarian, renal cell carcinoma, head and neck, renal cell, and colorectal cancers. It is also developing anti-CD27 agonist mAb immunotherapy to address the problem of exhausted T cells. The company has collaboration and license agreements with MSD International Business GmbH, Genentech, Inc., FAIR Therapeutics B.V., and GigaGen, Inc. Kineta, Inc. is headquartered in Seattle, Washington.

About Arcus Biosciences

Arcus Biosciences, Inc., a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company, develops and commercializes cancer therapies in the United States. The company's pipeline products include Domvanalimab, an anti-TIGIT antibody, which is in Phase 2 and Phase 3 clinical trial; and AB308, an investigational anti-TIGIT monoclonal antibody, which is in Phase 1b clinical trial to study people with advanced solid and hematologic malignancies. It also develops Etrumadenant, a dual A2a/A2b adenosine receptor antagonist, which is in Phase 2 clinical trial; Quemliclustat, a small-molecule CD73 inhibitor, which is Phase 1b and Phase 2 clinical trial; Zimberelimab, an anti-PD-1 antibody, which is in Phase 2 clinical trial for metastatic cell lung cancer and monotherapy; and AB521, an oral and small-molecule inhibitor of HIF-2a, which is in Phase 1 clinical trial for the treatment of Von Hippel-Lindau disease. In addition, the company's preclinical pipeline products include AB598, a CD39 antibody; and AB801, a small molecule Axl inhibitor. It has a clinical collaboration with AstraZeneca to evaluate domvanalimab in combination with durvalumab in a registrational phase 3 clinical trial in patients with unresectable Stage 3 NSCLC; and BVF Partners L.P. to support the discovery and development of compounds for the treatment of inflammatory diseases. Arcus Biosciences, Inc. was incorporated in 2015 and is headquartered in Hayward, California.