Head to Head Survey: Ormat Technologies (NYSE:ORA) & AGL Energy (OTCMKTS:AGLNF)

Ormat Technologies (NYSE:ORA) and AGL Energy (OTCMKTS:AGLNF) are both utilities companies, but which is the better business? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their profitability, risk, dividends, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, earnings and valuation.

Dividends

Ormat Technologies pays an annual dividend of $0.48 per share and has a dividend yield of 0.4%. AGL Energy pays an annual dividend of $0.60 per share and has a dividend yield of 10.9%. Ormat Technologies pays out 23.6% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. AGL Energy pays out 59.2% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Both companies have healthy payout ratios and should be able to cover their dividend payments with earnings for the next several years.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

95.5% of Ormat Technologies shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 15.3% of AGL Energy shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.5% of Ormat Technologies shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current ratings and target prices for Ormat Technologies and AGL Energy, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Ormat Technologies	1	5	8	0	2.50
AGL Energy	0	0	2	0	3.00

Ormat Technologies currently has a consensus target price of $131.50, indicating a potential upside of 21.56%. Given Ormat Technologies’ higher possible upside, equities analysts clearly believe Ormat Technologies is more favorable than AGL Energy.

Profitability

This table compares Ormat Technologies and AGL Energy’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Ormat Technologies	10.66%	6.61%	2.75%
AGL Energy	N/A	N/A	N/A

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Ormat Technologies and AGL Energy”s revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Ormat Technologies	$989.54 million	6.72	$123.90 million	$2.03	53.29
AGL Energy	N/A	N/A	N/A	$1.02	5.44

Ormat Technologies has higher revenue and earnings than AGL Energy. AGL Energy is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Ormat Technologies, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Summary

Ormat Technologies beats AGL Energy on 11 of the 13 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Ormat Technologies

Ormat Technologies, Inc. engages in the geothermal and recovered energy power business in the United States, Indonesia, Kenya, Turkey, Chile, Guatemala, Guadeloupe, New Zealand, Honduras, and internationally. It operates in three segments: Electricity, Product, and Energy Storage. The Electricity segment develops, builds, owns, and operates geothermal, solar photovoltaic, and recovered energy-based power plants; and sells electricity. The Product segment designs, manufactures, and sells equipment for geothermal and recovered energy-based electricity generation; and provides services relating to the engineering, procurement, construction, operation, and maintenance of geothermal and recovered energy-based power plants. This segment serves contractors; and owners and operators of interstate natural gas pipelines, gas processing plants, and cement plants, as well as companies in other energy-intensive industrial processes. The Energy Storage segment offers battery energy storage systems and related services. Ormat Technologies, Inc. was founded in 1965 and is headquartered in Reno, Nevada.

About AGL Energy

AGL Energy Limited supplies energy and other essential services to residential, small and large businesses, and wholesale customers in Australia. It operates through three segments: Customer Markets, Integrated Energy, and Investments. The company engages in retailing of electricity, gas, broadband, mobile, voice, solar, and energy products and services; and operates power generation portfolio and other assets including coal, gas and renewable generation, natural gas storage and production, and development projects. It also offers renewable energy schemes; and controls dispatch of owned and contracted generation assets, gas offtake agreements, and associated portfolio of energy hedging products. In addition, the company offers coal and gas-fired generation; and renewable energy sources, such as wind, hydro and solar, batteries and other firming technology; and gas production and storage assets. AGL Energy Limited was founded in 1837 and is based in Sydney, Australia.