Sifting through countless of stocks in the Machinery industry can be tedious, and sometimes two stocks are just too similar to judge which is the better investment. If you’re on the fence about investing in Pentair plc or Fortive Corporation because you’re not sure how they measure up, it’s important to compare them on a few factors before making your decision.

Read on to learn how Pentair plc and Fortive Corporation compare based on key financial metrics to determine which better meets your investment needs.

About Pentair plc and Fortive Corporation

Pentair plc provides various water solutions in the United States, Western Europe, China, Eastern Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Australia, Canada, and Japan. The company operates through three segments: Flow, Water Solutions, and Pool. The Flow segment designs, manufactures, and sells fluid treatment and pump products and systems, including pressure vessels, gas recovery solutions, membrane bioreactors, wastewater reuse systems and advanced membrane filtration, separation systems, water disposal pumps, water supply pumps, fluid transfer pumps, turbine pumps, solid handling pumps, and agricultural spray nozzles. This segment provides products under Pentair Flow, Aurora, Berkeley, Codeline, Fairbanks-Nijhuis, Haffmans, Hydromatic, Hypro, Jung Pumpen, Myers, Sta-Rite, Shurflo, Südmo, and X-Flow brand names. The Water Solutions segment offers commercial and residential water treatment products and systems, such as pressure tanks, control valves, activated carbon products, commercial ice machines, conventional filtration products, and point-of-entry and point-of-use water treatment systems for use in water filtration and water softening solutions, as well as commercial water management and filtration solutions in foodservice operations; and installation and preventative services for water management solutions for commercial operators under the Pentair Water Solutions, Everpure, Fleck, KBI, Manitowoc Ice, Pentek, and RainSoft brand names. The Pool segment provides residential and commercial pool equipment and accessories, including pumps, filters, heaters, lights, automatic controls, automatic cleaners, maintenance equipment, and pool accessories for residential and commercial pool maintenance, pool repair, renovation, service, construction, and aquaculture solutions. This segment offers products under the Pentair Pool, Kreepy Krauly, Pleatco, and Sta-Rite brand. Pentair plc was founded in 1966 and is headquartered in London, the United Kingdom.

Fortive Corporation designs, develops, manufactures, and markets products, software, and services in the United States, China, and internationally. It operates through Intelligent Operating Solutions and Advanced Healthcare Solutions segments. The Intelligent Operating Solutions segment provides advanced instrumentation, software, and services, including electrical test and measurement, facility and asset lifecycle software applications, and connected worker safety and compliance solutions for manufacturing, process industries, healthcare, utilities and power, communications and electronics, and other industries. This segment markets its products and services under the ACCRUENT, FLUKE, GORDIAN, INDUSTRIAL SCIENTIFIC, INTELEX, PRUFTECHNIK, and SERVICECHANNEL brand names. The Advanced Healthcare Solutions segment provides critical workflow solutions comprising instrument sterilization, instrument tracking, design and manufacture of cell therapy equipment, biomedical test tools, radiation detection and safety monitoring, and end-to-end clinical productivity software and solutions under the ASP, CENSIS, CENSITRAC, EVOTECH, FLUKE BIOMEDICAL, INVETECH, LANDAUER, PROVATION, RAYSAFE, and STERRAD brand names. Fortive Corporation was incorporated in 2015 and is headquartered in Everett, Washington.

Latest Machinery and Pentair plc, Fortive Corporation Stock News

As of November 21, 2025, Pentair plc had a $17.1 billion market capitalization, compared to the Machinery median of $2.8 million. Pentair plc’s stock is up 3.9% in 2025, up 2.7% in the previous five trading days and up 0.04% in the past year.

Currently, Pentair plc’s price-earnings ratio is 26.7. Pentair plc’s trailing 12-month revenue is $4.1 billion with a 15.8% net profit margin. Year-over-year quarterly sales growth most recently was 2.9%. Analysts expect adjusted earnings to reach $4.898 per share for the current fiscal year. Pentair plc currently has a 1.0% dividend yield.

As of November 21, 2025, Fortive Corporation had a $16.8 billion market cap, putting it in the 85th percentile of all stocks. Fortive Corporation’s stock is down 29.5% in 2025, up 4.7% in the previous five trading days and down 29.1% in the past year.

Currently, Fortive Corporation’s price-earnings ratio is 20.5. Fortive Corporation’s trailing 12-month revenue is $6.3 billion with a 9.6% net profit margin. Year-over-year quarterly sales growth most recently was 2.3%. Analysts expect adjusted earnings to reach $2.621 per share for the current fiscal year. Fortive Corporation currently has a 0.5% dividend yield.

How We Compare Pentair plc and Fortive Corporation Stock Grades

Stock evaluation requires access to huge amounts of data and the knowledge and time to sift through it all, make sense of financial ratios, read income statements and analyze recent stock movements. AAII created A+ Investor, a robust data suite that condenses data research in an actionable and customizable way suitable for investors of all knowledge levels, to help investors streamline and work through such data.

AAII’s proprietary stock grades come with A+ Investor. These offer intuitive A‐F grades for each of five key investing factors: value, growth, momentum, earnings estimate revisions and quality. Here, we’ll take a closer look at Pentair plc and Fortive Corporation’s stock grades to see how they measure up against one another.

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Pentair plc and Fortive Corporation Stock Value Grades

Company	Ticker	Value
Pentair plc	PNR	D
Fortive Corporation	FTV	C

Successful stock investing involves buying low and selling high, so stock valuation is an important consideration for stock selection.

Buying stocks that are going to go up typically means buying stocks that are undervalued in the first place, although momentum investors may argue that point.

AAII’s A+ Investor Value Grade derives from a stock’s value score. The Value Score is the percentile rank of the average of the percentile ranks of the price-to-sales ratio, price-earnings ratio, enterprise-value-to-EBITDA (EV/EBITDA) ratio, shareholder yield, price-to-book-value ratio and price-to-free-cash-flow ratio. The score is variable, meaning it can consider all six ratios or, should any of the six ratios not be valid, the remaining ratios that are valid. To be assigned a Value Score, stocks must have a valid (non-null) ratio and corresponding ranking for at least two of the six valuation ratios.

Stocks with a Value Score from 81 to 100 are considered deep value, those with a score between 61 and 80 are a good value and so on.

Pentair plc has a Value Score of 26, which is Expensive. Fortive Corporation has a Value Score of 47, which is Average.

The Value Stock Winner: No Clear Winner

Neither Pentair plc or Fortive Corporation has a high enough value grade to be considered a “winner.” Investors who are considering these companies should do additional due diligence and research to see if either could be a good addition to their portfolio. It’s important to look at a wide range of financial metrics in order to determine if Pentair plc or Fortive Corporation is the better investment when it comes to value.

Pentair plc and Fortive Corporation Growth Grades

Company	Ticker	Growth
Pentair plc	PNR	A
Fortive Corporation	FTV	A

The foundation of growth investing is seeking out stocks of companies exhibiting strong, consistent and prolonged growth that is expected to continue into the future.

In order to compute the growth score and assign it a letter grade, the percentile ranks for each of three components‐consistency of annual sales growth, five-year sales growth rankings adjusted for extreme levels, and consistency of positive annual cash from operations‐must be determined. These three rank figures are added together, and the sum is ranked against the entire stock universe to arrive at a company’s Growth Score to create an equal distribution of grades.

The companies in the bottom 20% of the stock universe receive Growth Grades of F, considered to be very weak, while those in the top 20% receive A grades, which are considered very strong.

Pentair plc has a Growth Score of 81, which is Very Strong. Fortive Corporation has a Growth Score of 100, which is Very Strong.

The Growth Grade Winner: It’s a Tie!

Looking at the Growth Grade breakdown above, both Pentair plc and Fortive Corporation have a grade of A. For investors who focus solely on a company’s upward growth, further research should be conducted into both companies’ other financial metrics before deciding whether to invest.

Pentair plc and Fortive Corporation’s Quality Grades

Company	Ticker	Quality
Pentair plc	PNR	A
Fortive Corporation	FTV	B

Like the Value Grade, AAII’s A+ Investor Quality Grade comes from the percentile rank of key metrics. Specifically, the Quality Score is the percentile rank of the average of the percentile ranks of return on assets (ROA), return on invested capital (ROIC), gross profit relative to assets, buyback yield, change in total liabilities to assets, accruals, Z double prime bankruptcy risk (Z) score and the F-Score.

The score is variable, meaning it can consider all eight measures or, should any of the eight measures not be valid, the remaining measures that are valid. To be assigned a Quality Score, stocks must have a valid (non-null) measure and corresponding ranking for at least four of the eight quality measures.

The Quality Score is used to assess the underlying “quality” of a particular stock. A higher-quality stock possesses traits associated with upside potential and reduced downside risk. Backtesting of the Quality Grade shows that stocks with higher grades, on average, outperformed stocks with lower grades over the period of 1998 through 2019.

Stocks receive better grades (higher scores) for having higher scores for the quality subcomponents and worse grades (lower scores) for lower scores for the subcomponents.

Pentair plc has a Quality Score of 92, which is Very Strong. Fortive Corporation has a Quality Score of 76, which is Strong.

The Quality Grade Winner: Pentair plc

As you can clearly see from the Quality Grade breakdown above, Pentair plc has a better overall quality grade than Fortive Corporation. For investors who are looking for companies with higher quality than others in the same industry, Pentair plc could be a good stock to add to their portfolios. However, it’s important for investors to analyze multiple factors based on a wide range of metrics before deciding whether to buy.

Other Pentair plc and Fortive Corporation Grades

In addition to Growth, Value and Quality, A+ Investor also provides grades for Momentum and Estimate Revisions.

Momentum grades help uncover stocks experiencing anomalously high rates of return; research finds that stocks with high relative levels of momentum tend to outperform, whereas those with low levels of momentum tend to continue underperforming.

Earnings estimate revisions scores take into account the magnitude of a company’s earnings surprise in its last two reported fiscal quarters. Often, surprises beget further surprises‐or at least continued sales growth (the exact opposite is generally true, too).

These 2 key factors, when combined with the above, provide a holistic view into a particular stock. Further, by joining A+ Investor you can see whether Pentair plc and Fortive Corporation pass any of our 60+ stock screens that have outperformed the market since their creation.

So, Which Is the Better Investment, Pentair plc or Fortive Corporation Stock?

Overall, Pentair plc stock has a Value Score of 26, Growth Score of 81 and Quality Score of 92.

Fortive Corporation stock has a Value Score of 47, Growth Score of 100 and Quality Score of 76.

Comparing Pentair plc and Fortive Corporation’s grades, scores and metrics can act as a solid basis to determine whether they may be a good investment or not. You’ll also want to look at your portfolio’s asset allocation as well as your risk tolerance and financial goals to see if either of these stocks would make a good fit for you. AAII can help you figure out which investments align with your individual needs and preferences.

Investors are encouraged to do their own due diligence and research. In this way, individuals can effectively become managers of their own assets‐without having to rely on others for financial independence. You can count on AAII for timeless articles on financial planning and stock-picking, unbiased research and actionable analysis.

A+ Investor adds to our qualitative teaching with a powerful data suite to help you whittle down investment choices to find stocks, exchange-traded funds (ETFs) or mutual funds that meet your needs.

AAII Disclaimer

We make no representations or warranties that any investor will, or is likely to, achieve profits similar to those shown, because past, hypothetical or simulated performance is not necessarily indicative of future results. Before making an investment decision, you should consider your circumstances and whether the information on our content is applicable to your situation. This information was prepared in good faith, and we accept no liability for any errors or omissions. The full disclaimer can be read here.