Head to Head Review: Uniti Group (NASDAQ:UNIT) & Global Net Lease (NYSE:GNL)

Global Net Lease (NYSE:GNL) and Uniti Group (NASDAQ:UNIT) are both real estate companies, but which is the better investment? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their dividends, risk, analyst recommendations, valuation, institutional ownership, profitability and earnings.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Global Net Lease and Uniti Group”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Global Net Lease	$495.29 million	3.70	-$225.46 million	($0.40)	-21.64
Uniti Group	$2.23 billion	1.05	$1.30 billion	$2.71	3.56

Uniti Group has higher revenue and earnings than Global Net Lease. Global Net Lease is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Uniti Group, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

61.2% of Global Net Lease shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 87.5% of Uniti Group shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.6% of Global Net Lease shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 1.9% of Uniti Group shares are owned 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.

Profitability

This table compares Global Net Lease and Uniti Group’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Global Net Lease	-8.72%	-2.90%	-1.07%
Uniti Group	28.68%	-133.07%	-4.09%

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of recent ratings for Global Net Lease and Uniti Group, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Global Net Lease	0	2	4	1	2.86
Uniti Group	0	7	1	1	2.33

Global Net Lease presently has a consensus price target of $10.33, suggesting a potential upside of 19.39%. Uniti Group has a consensus price target of $10.92, suggesting a potential upside of 13.24%. Given Global Net Lease’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, research analysts clearly believe Global Net Lease is more favorable than Uniti Group.

Volatility and Risk

Global Net Lease has a beta of 1.02, meaning that its stock price is 2% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Uniti Group has a beta of 1.4, meaning that its stock price is 40% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Uniti Group beats Global Net Lease on 8 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Global Net Lease

Global Net Lease, Inc. (NYSE: GNL) is a publicly traded real estate investment trust listed on the NYSE. The firm focused on acquiring a diversified global portfolio of commercial properties, with an emphasis on sale-leaseback transactions involving single tenant, mission critical income producing net-leased assets across the United States, Western and Northern Europe.

About Uniti Group

Uniti Group, Inc. is a real estate investment trust company, which engages in the acquisition, construction, and leasing of properties. It operates through the following business segments: Uniti Leasing, Uniti Fiber, and Corporate. The Uniti Leasing segment involves mission-critical communications assets on exclusive or shared-tenant basis, and dark fiber network. The Uniti Fiber segment includes the operation of infrastructure solutions, cell site backhauls, and dark fiber. The Corporate segment consists of office and shared service functions. The company was founded in February 2014 and is headquartered in Little Rock, AR.