Allstate (NYSE:ALL) vs. Sun Life Financial (NYSE:SLF) Financial Contrast

Allstate (NYSE:ALL) and Sun Life Financial (NYSE:SLF) are both large-cap finance companies, but which is the better investment? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their risk, institutional ownership, profitability, earnings, dividends, valuation and analyst recommendations.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent ratings for Allstate and Sun Life Financial, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Allstate	4	10	5	2	2.24
Sun Life Financial	1	5	5	1	2.50

Allstate presently has a consensus price target of $266.89, indicating a potential upside of 6.79%. Sun Life Financial has a consensus price target of $98.67, indicating a potential upside of 21.39%. Given Sun Life Financial’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe Sun Life Financial is more favorable than Allstate.

Risk and Volatility

Allstate has a beta of 0.15, suggesting that its share price is 85% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Sun Life Financial has a beta of 0.87, suggesting that its share price is 13% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares Allstate and Sun Life Financial’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Allstate	18.97%	41.64%	9.82%
Sun Life Financial	7.66%	17.96%	1.08%

Institutional & Insider Ownership

76.5% of Allstate shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 52.3% of Sun Life Financial shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.5% of Allstate shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Dividends

Allstate pays an annual dividend of $4.32 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.7%. Sun Life Financial pays an annual dividend of $2.73 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.4%. Allstate pays out 8.6% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Sun Life Financial pays out 63.8% 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. Allstate has increased its dividend for 15 consecutive years and Sun Life Financial has increased its dividend for 11 consecutive years.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares Allstate and Sun Life Financial”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Allstate	$69.35 billion	0.91	$10.28 billion	$50.08	4.99
Sun Life Financial	$40.60 billion	1.11	$2.68 billion	$4.28	18.99

Allstate has higher revenue and earnings than Sun Life Financial. Allstate is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Sun Life Financial, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Summary

Allstate beats Sun Life Financial on 11 of the 17 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Allstate

The Allstate Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides property and casualty, and other insurance products in the United States and Canada. It operates in five segments: Allstate Protection; Protection Services; Allstate Health and Benefits; Run-off Property-Liability; and Corporate and Other segments. The Allstate Protection segment offers private passenger auto and homeowners insurance; other personal lines products; and commercial lines products through agents, contact centers, and online. The Protection Services segment provides consumer product protection; protection and insurance products, including vehicle service contracts, guaranteed asset protection, road hazard tire and wheel, and paintless dent repair protection; and roadside assistance, device and mobile data collection services, and analytic solutions using automotive telematics information, as well as identity theft protection and remediation services. This segment also offers its products under various brands, including Allstate Protection Plans, Allstate Dealer Services, Allstate Roadside, Arity, Avail, and Allstate Identity Protection. The Allstate Health and Benefits segment provides life, accident, critical illness, short-term disability, and other health insurance products; stop-loss and fully insured group health products to employers; and short-term medical and medicare supplement insurance to individuals. The Run-off Property-Liability segment offers property and casualty insurance coverage that primarily relates to policies written during the 1960s through the mid-1980s. The Corporate and Other segment provides debt services, as well as non-insurance operations. It sells its products through agents, independent agents, call and contact centers, retailers, direct to consumer, wholesale partners, and affinity groups, as well as through online and mobile applications. The Allstate Corporation was founded in 1931 and is headquartered in Northbrook, Illinois.

About Sun Life Financial

Sun Life Financial Inc., a financial services company, provides savings, retirement, and pension products worldwide. The company operates in five segments: Asset Management, Canada, U.S., Asia, and Corporate. It offers various insurance products, such as term and permanent life; personal health, which includes prescription drugs, dental, and vision care; critical illness; long-term care; and disability, as well as reinsurance. The company also provides advice for financial planning and retirement planning services; investments products, such as mutual funds, segregated funds, and annuities; and asset and investment management products consisting of pooled funds, institutional portfolios, and pension funds. In addition, it offers real estate services; manages equity capital in various private and listed funds, as well as mezzanine debt, middle market direct lending, high-yield bonds, and syndicated loans; and operates as an investment grade fixed income investor, real estate investment management advisor, infrastructure investment manager, and alternative credit investment manager. The company was formerly known as Sun Life Financial Services of Canada Inc. and changed its name to Sun Life Financial Inc. in July 2003. Sun Life Financial Inc. was founded in 1871 and is headquartered in Toronto, Canada.