Head-To-Head Comparison: Goosehead Insurance (NASDAQ:GSHD) versus MBIA (NYSE:MBI)

Goosehead Insurance (NASDAQ:GSHD) and MBIA (NYSE:MBI) are both small-cap finance companies, but which is the better business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their earnings, profitability, risk, institutional ownership, valuation, dividends and analyst recommendations.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent ratings for Goosehead Insurance and MBIA, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Goosehead Insurance	0	6	7	0	2.54
MBIA	1	0	1	0	2.00

Goosehead Insurance presently has a consensus price target of $75.70, suggesting a potential upside of 65.90%. MBIA has a consensus price target of $7.50, suggesting a potential upside of 25.31%. Given Goosehead Insurance’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, equities analysts plainly believe Goosehead Insurance is more favorable than MBIA.

Profitability

This table compares Goosehead Insurance and MBIA’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Goosehead Insurance	7.62%	-21.31%	7.79%
MBIA	-221.25%	N/A	-1.68%

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares Goosehead Insurance and MBIA”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Goosehead Insurance	$365.30 million	4.57	$27.83 million	$1.04	43.88
MBIA	$80.00 million	3.81	-$177.00 million	($3.58)	-1.67

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

Volatility and Risk

Goosehead Insurance has a beta of 1.69, meaning that its stock price is 69% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, MBIA has a beta of 1.81, meaning that its stock price is 81% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

61.0% of MBIA shares are held by institutional investors. 48.4% of Goosehead Insurance shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 12.6% of MBIA shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Summary

Goosehead Insurance beats MBIA on 11 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Goosehead Insurance

Goosehead Insurance, Inc. operates as a holding company for Goosehead Financial, LLC that engages in the provision of personal lines insurance agency services in the United States. The company offers homeowner’s, automotive, dwelling property, flood, wind, earthquake, excess liability or umbrella, motorcycle, recreational vehicle, general liability, property, and life insurance products and services. As of December 31, 2023, it operated 1,415 franchise locations. The company was founded in 2003 and is headquartered in Westlake, Texas.

About MBIA

MBIA Inc. provides financial guarantee insurance services to public finance markets in the United States. It operates United States (U.S.) Public Finance Insurance, and International and Structured Finance Insurance segments. The company issues financial guarantees for municipal bonds, including tax-exempt and taxable indebtedness of the U.S. political subdivisions, as well as utility districts, airports, health care institutions, higher educational facilities, housing authorities, and other similar agencies and obligations issued by private entities. It also insures the non-U.S. public finance and global structured finance, including asset-backed obligations; and sovereign-related and sub-sovereign bonds, and privately issued bonds used for the financing for utilities, toll roads, bridges, public transportation facilities, and other types of infrastructure projects, as well as offers third-party reinsurance services. MBIA Inc. was founded in 1973 and is headquartered in Purchase, New York.