Atlantic International (NASDAQ:CIRC) and LendingTree (NASDAQ:TREE) Critical Comparison

LendingTree (NASDAQ:TREE) and Atlantic International (NASDAQ:CIRC) are both small-cap finance companies, but which is the better business? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their profitability, risk, institutional ownership, earnings, valuation, dividends and analyst recommendations.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares LendingTree and Atlantic International”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
LendingTree	$1.27 billion	0.32	$151.31 million	$12.90	2.24
Atlantic International	$435.88 million	0.15	-$59.43 million	($2.11)	-0.34

LendingTree has higher revenue and earnings than Atlantic International. Atlantic International is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than LendingTree, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Profitability

This table compares LendingTree and Atlantic International’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
LendingTree	14.33%	14.57%	4.49%
Atlantic International	-19.39%	N/A	-28.58%

Institutional and Insider Ownership

68.3% of LendingTree shares are owned by institutional investors. 4.0% of LendingTree shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 7.6% of Atlantic International shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Volatility and Risk

LendingTree has a beta of 2.04, suggesting that its stock price is 104% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Atlantic International has a beta of 0.81, suggesting that its stock price is 19% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent ratings and target prices for LendingTree and Atlantic International, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
LendingTree	0	2	5	0	2.71
Atlantic International	1	1	0	1	2.33

LendingTree currently has a consensus price target of $61.33, indicating a potential upside of 111.79%. Given LendingTree’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, equities research analysts plainly believe LendingTree is more favorable than Atlantic International.

Summary

LendingTree beats Atlantic International on 13 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About LendingTree

LendingTree, Inc., through its subsidiary, operates online consumer platform in the United States. It operates through three segments: Home, Consumer, and Insurance. The Home segment offers purchase mortgage, refinance mortgage, and home equity loans and lines of credit; and real estate brokerage services. The Consumer segment provides credit cards; personal, small business, student, and auto loans; deposit accounts; and other credit products, such as debt settlement services. The Insurance segment includes information, tools, and access to insurance quote products, including home, automobile, and health and Medicare through which consumers are matched with insurance lead aggregators to obtain insurance offers and policies. In addition, the company offers QuoteWizard, a marketplace for insurance comparison; ValuePenguin, a personal finance website that offers consumers objective analysis on various financial topics from insurance to credit cards; and Stash, a consumer investing and banking platform that offers a suite of personal investment accounts, traditional and Roth IRAs, custodial investment accounts, and banking services, including checking accounts and debit cards with a Stock-Back rewards program. The company was formerly known as Tree.com, Inc. and changed its name to LendingTree, Inc. in January 2015. LendingTree, Inc. was incorporated in 1996 and is based in Charlotte, North Carolina.

About Atlantic International

Atlantic International Corp., through its subsidiaries, operates as a staffing company servicing the commercial, professional, finance, direct placement, and managed service provider verticals. The company specializes in permanent, temporary, and temporary-to-permanent placement services in various areas, including accounting and finance, administrative and clerical, hospitality, information technology, legal, light industrial, and medical fields. It also provides productivity consulting and workforce management solutions. Atlantic International Corp. was founded in 2018 and is based in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey.