Comparing Peoples Financial Services (NASDAQ:PFIS) & Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria (NYSE:BBVA)

Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria (NYSE:BBVA) and Peoples Financial Services (NASDAQ:PFIS) are both finance companies, but which is the better investment? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their risk, earnings, analyst recommendations, institutional ownership, valuation, dividends and profitability.

Risk & Volatility

Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria has a beta of 0.82, meaning that its stock price is 18% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Peoples Financial Services has a beta of 0.75, meaning that its stock price is 25% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of current ratings and recommmendations for Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria and Peoples Financial Services, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria	1	8	4	1	2.36
Peoples Financial Services	0	3	1	0	2.25

Peoples Financial Services has a consensus target price of $65.50, suggesting a potential downside of 3.75%. Given Peoples Financial Services’ higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Peoples Financial Services is more favorable than Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria.

Dividends

Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria pays an annual dividend of $0.68 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.6%. Peoples Financial Services pays an annual dividend of $2.50 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.7%. Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria pays out 30.9% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Peoples Financial Services pays out 28.3% 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. Peoples Financial Services has increased its dividend for 8 consecutive years. Peoples Financial Services is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

3.0% of Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 31.7% of Peoples Financial Services shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.0% of Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 8.2% of Peoples Financial Services shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria and Peoples Financial Services”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria	$41.77 billion	3.46	$11.89 billion	$2.20	11.77
Peoples Financial Services	$283.67 million	2.40	$59.19 million	$8.83	7.71

Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria has higher revenue and earnings than Peoples Financial Services. Peoples Financial Services is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Profitability

This table compares Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria and Peoples Financial Services’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria	27.75%	18.05%	1.27%
Peoples Financial Services	20.66%	17.27%	1.70%

Summary

Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria beats Peoples Financial Services on 10 of the 18 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Banco Bilbao Viscaya Argentaria

Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria, S.A. provides retail banking, wholesale banking, and asset management services in the United States, Spain, Mexico, Turkey, South America, and internationally. The company offers savings account, demand deposits, and time deposits; and loan products, such as residential mortgages, other households, credit card loans, loans to enterprises and public sector, as well as consumer finance. It provides insurance and asset management business, including corporate, commercial, SME, payment systems, retail, private and investment banking, pension and life insurance, leasing, factoring, and brokerage. The company provides its products through online and mobile channels. Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria, S.A. was founded in 1857 and is headquartered in Bilbao, Spain.

About Peoples Financial Services

Peoples Financial Services Corp. operates as the bank holding company for Peoples Security Bank and Trust Company that provides various commercial and retail banking services. The company accepts money market, negotiable order of withdrawal, savings, individual retirement, demand deposit, and certificates of deposit accounts. It also provides residential real estate, automobile, manufactured housing, personal, and home equity loans; and commercial real estate, working capital, construction, small business administration, and agricultural loans, as well as loans for equipment and other commercial needs, and mineral rights. In addition, the company offers fiduciary and investment services; investment management, IRA trustee, estate administration, living and life insurance trust, trustee under will, guardianship, custodial/IRA custodial, and corporate trust services, as well as pension and profit-sharing plans. Further, it provides wealth management products and services comprising investment portfolio management, estate and business succession planning, annuities, insurance, retirement plan, and tax planning, as well as education funding strategies; and securities, brokerage, and investor services. Additionally, the company offers small business checking and merchant money market accounts, online and telephone banking, business credit cards, merchant line of credit, and financial checkup services; and remote deposit capture, automatic clearing house transaction, cash management, automated teller machine, point of sale transaction, safe deposit box, night depository, direct deposit, and official check services. It serves business, non-profit, governmental, municipal agency, and professional customers, as well as retail customers. Peoples Financial Services Corp. was founded in 1905 and is headquartered in Scranton, Pennsylvania.