Analyzing John Hancock Hedged Equity & Income Fund (NYSE:HEQ) & Artisan Partners Asset Management (NYSE:APAM)

Artisan Partners Asset Management (NYSE:APAM) and John Hancock Hedged Equity & Income Fund (NYSE:HEQ) are both finance companies, but which is the superior stock? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, dividends, profitability, earnings, valuation and risk.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent recommendations for Artisan Partners Asset Management and John Hancock Hedged Equity & Income Fund, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Artisan Partners Asset Management	2	3	1	0	1.83
John Hancock Hedged Equity & Income Fund	0	0	0	0	0.00

Artisan Partners Asset Management currently has a consensus price target of $38.00, suggesting a potential downside of 12.76%. Given Artisan Partners Asset Management’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Artisan Partners Asset Management is more favorable than John Hancock Hedged Equity & Income Fund.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

86.4% of Artisan Partners Asset Management shares are owned by institutional investors. 11.3% of Artisan Partners Asset Management shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Dividends

Artisan Partners Asset Management pays an annual dividend of $3.20 per share and has a dividend yield of 7.3%. John Hancock Hedged Equity & Income Fund pays an annual dividend of $1.00 per share and has a dividend yield of 8.4%. Artisan Partners Asset Management pays out 77.7% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future.

Profitability

This table compares Artisan Partners Asset Management and John Hancock Hedged Equity & Income Fund’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Artisan Partners Asset Management	24.08%	73.11%	21.93%
John Hancock Hedged Equity & Income Fund	N/A	N/A	N/A

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares Artisan Partners Asset Management and John Hancock Hedged Equity & Income Fund”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Artisan Partners Asset Management	$1.25 billion	2.83	$290.32 million	$4.12	10.57
John Hancock Hedged Equity & Income Fund	$21.10 million	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A

Artisan Partners Asset Management has higher revenue and earnings than John Hancock Hedged Equity & Income Fund.

Summary

Artisan Partners Asset Management beats John Hancock Hedged Equity & Income Fund on 9 of the 11 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Artisan Partners Asset Management

Artisan Partners Asset Management Inc. is publicly owned investment manager. It provides its services to pension and profit sharing plans, trusts, endowments, foundations, charitable organizations, government entities, private funds and non-U.S. funds, as well as mutual funds, non-U.S. funds and collective trusts. It manages separate client-focused equity and fixed income portfolios. The firm invests in the public equity and fixed income markets across the globe. It invests in growth and value stocks of companies across all market capitalization. For fixed income component of its portfolio the firm invests in non-investment grade corporate bonds and secured and unsecured loans. It employs fundamental analysis to create its portfolios. Artisan Partners Asset Management Inc. was founded in 1994 and is based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin with additional offices in Atlanta, Georgia; New York City; San Francisco, California; Leawood, Kansas; and London, United Kingdom.

About John Hancock Hedged Equity & Income Fund

John Hancock Hedged Equity & Income Fund is a closed-ended equity mutual fund launched and managed by John Hancock Investment Management LLC. The fund is co-managed by Wellington Management Company LLP. It invests in the public equity markets of the United States. The fund seeks to invest in stocks of companies operating across diversified sectors. It invests in stocks of companies across all market capitalizations. The fund also invests through derivatives such as call options and equity futures. John Hancock Hedged Equity & Income Fund was formed on May 26, 2011 and is domiciled in the United States.