LULU vs MA: Which Is the Better Buy?
Side-by-side comparison of Lululemon Athletica Inc. and Mastercard Incorporated — fair value, conviction, valuation metrics, and QuantHub research signals.
Updated 2026-07-17.
Lululemon Athletica Inc. · Consumer Cyclical
$116.33
+45.0% upside to fair value
Med Conviction
Grade B-
VS
Mastercard Incorporated · Financial Services
$543.60
+45.0% upside to fair value
High Conviction
Grade A
High Quality
Valuation & Fundamentals
| Metric |
LULU |
MA |
| Current Price |
$116.33 |
$543.60 |
| Fair Value Estimate |
$168.68 |
$788.22 |
| Upside to Fair Value |
+45.0%
|
+45.0%
|
| Market Cap |
$13.2B |
$480.3B |
| Forward P/E |
—
|
—
|
| EV / EBITDA |
5.3x
|
23.3x
|
| Price / Sales |
1.2x
|
14.2x
|
| Price / FCF |
10.3x
|
27.1x
|
| Revenue Growth YoY |
+4.3%
|
+15.8%
|
| Gross Margin |
55.7%
|
83.0%
|
| Operating Margin |
18.2%
|
59.4%
|
| Return on Equity |
31.3%
|
206.1%
|
| Dividend Yield |
0% |
0.62% |
| FCF Yield |
9.69%
|
3.69%
|
| Analyst Consensus |
Hold
|
Strong Buy
|
Investment Thesis
Lululemon Athletica is a premium athletic-apparel retailer whose technical-product innovation, powerful brand, direct-to-consumer retail and e-commerce model, and community-led marketing have historically supported high returns, including a 31.3% ROE, 55.7% gross margin, 18.2% operating margin, and 13.0% net margin. The investment case is now a turnaround rather than a clean compounding story: in…
Mastercard operates a global two-sided payments network that connects issuers, acquirers, merchants and cardholders, monetizing payment volumes and an expanding set of security, data, authentication and other value-added services. Business quality is high: the network benefits from powerful acceptance and scale effects, 83.0% gross margin, 59.4% operating margin, 45.9% net margin, 206.1% ROE, and…
Accumulation Zones
| Metric |
LULU |
MA |
| Zone Low |
$126.51 |
$591.16 |
| Zone High |
$143.38 |
$669.99 |
| In Buy Zone? |
Yes
|
Yes
|