Reviewing Ascendis Pharma A/S (NASDAQ:ASND) & Erasca (NASDAQ:ERAS)

Ascendis Pharma A/S (NASDAQ:ASND) and Erasca (NASDAQ:ERAS) are both medical companies, but which is the superior stock? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, dividends, valuation, institutional ownership, earnings, profitability and risk.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

67.8% of Erasca shares are held by institutional investors. 40.0% of Ascendis Pharma A/S shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 21.5% of Erasca shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Volatility & Risk

Ascendis Pharma A/S has a beta of 0.59, indicating that its stock price is 41% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Erasca has a beta of 1.18, indicating that its stock price is 18% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent recommendations and price targets for Ascendis Pharma A/S and Erasca, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Ascendis Pharma A/S	0	1	8	0	2.89
Erasca	0	1	4	0	2.80

Ascendis Pharma A/S presently has a consensus target price of $179.44, suggesting a potential upside of 40.59%. Erasca has a consensus target price of $6.00, suggesting a potential upside of 176.50%. Given Erasca’s higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe Erasca is more favorable than Ascendis Pharma A/S.

Profitability

This table compares Ascendis Pharma A/S and Erasca’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Ascendis Pharma A/S	-152.68%	-16,574.15%	-60.06%
Erasca	N/A	-38.83%	-31.22%

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Ascendis Pharma A/S and Erasca’s revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Ascendis Pharma A/S	$288.08 million	25.80	-$521.07 million	($9.61)	-13.28
Erasca	N/A	N/A	-$125.04 million	($0.84)	-2.58

Erasca has lower revenue, but higher earnings than Ascendis Pharma A/S. Ascendis Pharma A/S is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Erasca, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Summary

Erasca beats Ascendis Pharma A/S on 9 of the 13 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Ascendis Pharma A/S

Ascendis Pharma A/S, a biopharmaceutical company, focuses on developing therapies for unmet medical needs. It offers SKYTROFA for treating patients with growth hormone deficiency (GHD). The company is also developing a pipeline of three independent endocrinology rare disease product candidates in clinical development, as well as focuses on advancing oncology therapeutic candidates. The company was incorporated in 2006 and is headquartered in Hellerup, Denmark.

About Erasca

Erasca, Inc., a clinical-stage precision oncology company, focuses on discovering, developing, and commercializing therapies for patients with RAS/MAPK pathway-driven cancers. The company's lead product is naporafenib which is in phase 1b trial for patients with RAS Q16X solid tumors and plans to initiate a pivotal Phase 3 trial for patients with NRASm melanoma. It also develops ERAS-007, an oral inhibitor of ERK1/2 for the treatment of non-small cell lung and colorectal cancer, and advanced gastrointestinal malignancies; and ERAS-601, an oral SHP2 inhibitor for patients with advanced or metastatic solid tumors. In addition, it is developing ERAS-801, a central nervous system-penetrant EGFR inhibitor which is in phase 1 clinical trials for the treatment of patients with recurrent glioblastoma multiforme. The company entered into license agreement with Novartis to develop, manufacture, use, and commercialize naporafenib; Katmai Pharmaceuticals, Inc. to develop, manufacture, use, and commercialize ERAS-801 and certain other related compounds; and NiKang Therapeutics, Inc. to develop and commercialize ERAS-601 and certain other related compounds. Erasca, Inc. was incorporated in 2018 and is headquartered in San Diego, California.