Head to Head Contrast: BlackRock (NYSE:BLK) versus Cohen & Steers (NYSE:CNS)

BlackRock (NYSE:BLK) and Cohen & Steers (NYSE:CNS) are both finance companies, but which is the superior investment? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their earnings, risk, dividends, profitability, analyst recommendations, institutional ownership and valuation.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares BlackRock and Cohen & Steers”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
BlackRock	$24.22 billion	7.25	$5.55 billion	$43.98	25.76
Cohen & Steers	$556.12 million	6.42	$153.22 million	$3.26	21.29

BlackRock has higher revenue and earnings than Cohen & Steers. Cohen & Steers is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than BlackRock, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current recommendations and price targets for BlackRock and Cohen & Steers, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
BlackRock	0	2	14	1	2.94
Cohen & Steers	0	1	2	0	2.67

BlackRock currently has a consensus price target of $1,312.06, suggesting a potential upside of 15.80%. Cohen & Steers has a consensus price target of $88.00, suggesting a potential upside of 26.81%. Given Cohen & Steers’ higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe Cohen & Steers is more favorable than BlackRock.

Volatility & Risk

BlackRock has a beta of 1.41, meaning that its share price is 41% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Cohen & Steers has a beta of 1.22, meaning that its share price is 22% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares BlackRock and Cohen & Steers’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
BlackRock	24.22%	16.08%	5.32%
Cohen & Steers	28.16%	27.45%	19.70%

Insider & Institutional Ownership

80.7% of BlackRock shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 51.5% of Cohen & Steers shares are held by institutional investors. 1.9% of BlackRock shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 45.4% of Cohen & Steers shares 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.

Dividends

BlackRock pays an annual dividend of $22.92 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.0%. Cohen & Steers pays an annual dividend of $2.68 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.9%. BlackRock pays out 52.1% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Cohen & Steers pays out 82.2% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. BlackRock has raised its dividend for 16 consecutive years and Cohen & Steers has raised its dividend for 16 consecutive years.

Summary

BlackRock beats Cohen & Steers on 11 of the 17 factors compared between the two stocks.

About BlackRock

BlackRock, Inc. is a publicly owned investment manager. The firm primarily provides its services to institutional, intermediary, and individual investors including corporate, public, union, and industry pension plans, insurance companies, third-party mutual funds, endowments, public institutions, governments, foundations, charities, sovereign wealth funds, corporations, official institutions, and banks. It also provides global risk management and advisory services. The firm manages separate client-focused equity, fixed income, and balanced portfolios. It also launches and manages open-end and closed-end mutual funds, offshore funds, unit trusts, and alternative investment vehicles including structured funds. The firm launches equity, fixed income, balanced, and real estate mutual funds. It also launches equity, fixed income, balanced, currency, commodity, and multi-asset exchange traded funds. The firm also launches and manages hedge funds. It invests in the public equity, fixed income, real estate, currency, commodity, and alternative markets across the globe. The firm primarily invests in growth and value stocks of small-cap, mid-cap, SMID-cap, large-cap, and multi-cap companies. It also invests in dividend-paying equity securities. The firm invests in investment grade municipal securities, government securities including securities issued or guaranteed by a government or a government agency or instrumentality, corporate bonds, and asset-backed and mortgage-backed securities. It employs fundamental and quantitative analysis with a focus on bottom-up and top-down approach to make its investments. The firm employs liquidity, asset allocation, balanced, real estate, and alternative strategies to make its investments. In real estate sector, it seeks to invest in Poland and Germany. The firm benchmarks the performance of its portfolios against various S&P, Russell, Barclays, MSCI, Citigroup, and Merrill Lynch indices. BlackRock, Inc. was founded in 1988 and is based in New York City with additional offices in Boston, Massachusetts; London, United Kingdom; Gurgaon, India; Hong Kong; Greenwich, Connecticut; Princeton, New Jersey; Edinburgh, United Kingdom; Sydney, Australia; Taipei, Taiwan; Singapore; Sao Paulo, Brazil; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Washington, District of Columbia; Toronto, Canada; Wilmington, Delaware; and San Francisco, California.

About Cohen & Steers

Cohen & Steers, Inc. is a holding company, which operates as an investment manager specializing in liquid real assets, which include real estate securities, listed infrastructure, commodities, natural resource equities, preferred securities, and other income solutions. It manages investment vehicles, such as institutional accounts, open-end funds and closed-end funds. The company was founded by Martin Cohen and Robert Hamilton Steers in 1986 and is headquartered in New York, NY.