Critical Review: Assurant (NYSE:AIZ) & Hippo (NYSE:HIPO)

Hippo (NYSE:HIPO) and Assurant (NYSE:AIZ) are both finance companies, but which is the better business? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their risk, institutional ownership, earnings, dividends, valuation, analyst recommendations and profitability.

Volatility & Risk

Hippo has a beta of 1.57, meaning that its share price is 57% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Assurant has a beta of 0.56, meaning that its share price is 44% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

43.0% of Hippo shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 92.7% of Assurant shares are owned by institutional investors. 10.8% of Hippo shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.5% of Assurant shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current ratings and recommmendations for Hippo and Assurant, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Hippo	1	1	4	1	2.71
Assurant	0	2	8	0	2.80

Hippo presently has a consensus target price of $37.50, suggesting a potential upside of 30.67%. Assurant has a consensus target price of $258.17, suggesting a potential upside of 12.37%. Given Hippo’s higher probable upside, research analysts plainly believe Hippo is more favorable than Assurant.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Hippo and Assurant”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Hippo	$450.10 million	1.62	-$40.50 million	$2.14	13.41
Assurant	$12.81 billion	0.89	$872.70 million	$16.97	13.54

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

Profitability

This table compares Hippo and Assurant’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Hippo	12.31%	-2.36%	-0.50%
Assurant	6.81%	18.65%	2.92%

Summary

Assurant beats Hippo on 9 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Hippo

Hippo Holdings Inc. provides property and casualty insurance products to individuals and business customers primarily in the United States. The company operates through three segments: Services, Insurance-as-a-Service, and Hippo Home Insurance Program. Its insurance products include homeowners' insurance against risks of fire, wind, and theft, as well as other personal lines policies from third party carriers; and personal and commercial, as well as home, auto, cyber, small business, life, specialty lines, and other insurance products. The company distributes insurance products and services through its technology platform and website, as well as operates licensed insurance agencies. Hippo Holdings Inc. is headquartered in Palo Alto, California.

About Assurant

Assurant, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, provides business services that supports, protects, and connects consumer purchases in North America, Latin America, Europe, and the Asia Pacific. The company operates through two segments: Global Lifestyle and Global Housing. The Global Lifestyle segment offers mobile device solutions, and extended service contracts and related services for consumer electronics and appliances, and credit and other insurance products; and vehicle protection, commercial equipment, and other related services. The Global Housing segment provides lender-placed homeowners, manufactured housing, and flood insurance; renters insurance and related products; and voluntary manufactured housing, and condominium and homeowners insurance products. The company was formerly known as Fortis, Inc. and changed its name to Assurant, Inc. in February 2004. Assurant, Inc. was founded in 1892 and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia.