Critical Comparison: Mesabi Trust (MSB) and Its Peers

Mesabi Trust (NYSE:MSB) is one of 1,987 publicly-traded companies in the “Metals & Mining” industry, but how does it weigh in compared to its rivals? We will compare Mesabi Trust to similar businesses based on the strength of its risk, profitability, earnings, dividends, institutional ownership, valuation and analyst recommendations.

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Mesabi Trust and its rivals gross revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Net Income	Price/Earnings Ratio
Mesabi Trust	$11.21 million	$13.87 million	42.06
Mesabi Trust Competitors	$174.27 billion	$277.23 million	-32.48

Mesabi Trust’s rivals have higher revenue and earnings than Mesabi Trust. Mesabi Trust is trading at a higher price-to-earnings ratio than its rivals, indicating that it is currently more expensive than other companies in its industry.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current ratings for Mesabi Trust and its rivals, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Mesabi Trust	0	1	0	0	2.00
Mesabi Trust Competitors	6303	22410	31976	1766	2.47

As a group, “Metals & Mining” companies have a potential upside of 14.42%. Given Mesabi Trust’s rivals stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Mesabi Trust has less favorable growth aspects than its rivals.

Profitability

This table compares Mesabi Trust and its rivals’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Mesabi Trust	54.46%	32.52%	26.92%
Mesabi Trust Competitors	-1,161,736,352,322,426,600.00%	-9.12%	-2.11%

Insider and Institutional Ownership

15.9% of shares of all “Metals & Mining” companies are held by institutional investors. 0.3% of Mesabi Trust shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 17.7% of shares of all “Metals & Mining” companies are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Volatility and Risk

Mesabi Trust has a beta of 0.34, meaning that its share price is 66% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Mesabi Trust’s rivals have a beta of 1.02, meaning that their average share price is 2% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Dividends

Mesabi Trust pays an annual dividend of $0.20 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.0%. Mesabi Trust pays out 40.8% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. As a group, “Metals & Mining” companies pay a dividend yield of 9.3% and pay out 10.8% of their earnings in the form of a dividend. Mesabi Trust lags its rivals as a dividend stock, given its lower dividend yield and higher payout ratio.

Summary

Mesabi Trust rivals beat Mesabi Trust on 11 of the 15 factors compared.

About Mesabi Trust

Mesabi Trust, a royalty trust, engages in iron ore mining business in the United States. Mesabi Trust was founded in 1961 and is based in New York, New York.