Head-To-Head Survey: Oportun Financial (NASDAQ:OPRT) and PROG (NYSE:PRG)

Oportun Financial (NASDAQ:OPRT) and PROG (NYSE:PRG) are both small-cap finance companies, but which is the better investment? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their valuation, analyst recommendations, profitability, dividends, earnings, risk and institutional ownership.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current ratings for Oportun Financial and PROG, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Oportun Financial	1	2	2	0	2.20
PROG	0	3	6	1	2.80

Oportun Financial presently has a consensus price target of $7.33, indicating a potential downside of 0.90%. PROG has a consensus price target of $49.44, indicating a potential upside of 18.70%. Given PROG’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe PROG is more favorable than Oportun Financial.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

82.7% of Oportun Financial shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 97.9% of PROG shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.6% of Oportun Financial shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 3.7% of PROG shares are owned by company 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.

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Oportun Financial and PROG”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Oportun Financial	$395.98 million	0.86	$25.25 million	$0.40	18.50
PROG	$2.61 billion	0.63	$146.79 million	$3.62	11.51

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

Risk & Volatility

Oportun Financial has a beta of 1.22, meaning that its stock price is 22% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, PROG has a beta of 1.79, meaning that its stock price is 79% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares Oportun Financial and PROG’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Oportun Financial	2.05%	13.55%	1.65%
PROG	5.57%	21.88%	9.15%

Summary

PROG beats Oportun Financial on 13 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Oportun Financial

Oportun Financial Corporation provides financial services. The company offers personal loans and credit cards. It serves customers through online and over the phone, as well as through retail and Lending as a Service partner locations. The company was founded in 2005 and is headquartered in San Carlos, California.

About PROG

PROG Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:PRG) is a financial technology holding company based in Salt Lake City, Utah with three business segments: Progressive Leasing, which offers lease-to-own transactions primarily to credit-challenged consumers through e-commerce and point-of-sale retail partners, via online, mobile, and in-store solutions; Vive Financial, which provides consumers who may not qualify for traditional prime lending with a variety of second-look, revolving credit products through private label and branded credit cards; and Four Technologies, which provides consumers of all credit backgrounds Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) options through four interest-free installments via its platform, Four.