Geospace Technologies (NASDAQ:GEOS) versus Seadrill (NYSE:SDRL) Head to Head Comparison

Geospace Technologies (NASDAQ:GEOS) and Seadrill (NYSE:SDRL) are both energy companies, but which is the better business? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, profitability, risk, valuation, dividends and earnings.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

57.2% of Geospace Technologies shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 95.7% of Seadrill shares are owned by institutional investors. 3.0% of Geospace Technologies shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.5% of Seadrill shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Risk & Volatility

Geospace Technologies has a beta of 0.13, suggesting that its share price is 87% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Seadrill has a beta of 1.25, suggesting that its share price is 25% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent ratings for Geospace Technologies and Seadrill, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Geospace Technologies	1	0	0	0	1.00
Seadrill	0	3	3	3	3.00

Seadrill has a consensus price target of $59.40, indicating a potential upside of 14.58%. Given Seadrill’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe Seadrill is more favorable than Geospace Technologies.

Profitability

This table compares Geospace Technologies and Seadrill’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Geospace Technologies	-43.10%	-35.80%	-28.30%
Seadrill	0.07%	0.64%	0.46%

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Geospace Technologies and Seadrill”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Geospace Technologies	$110.80 million	0.51	-$9.72 million	($3.08)	-1.43
Seadrill	$1.44 billion	2.26	-$77.00 million	$0.03	1,728.07

Geospace Technologies has higher earnings, but lower revenue than Seadrill. Geospace Technologies is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Seadrill, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Summary

Seadrill beats Geospace Technologies on 12 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Geospace Technologies

Geospace Technologies Corporation designs and manufactures instruments and equipment used in the oil and gas industry to acquire seismic data in order to locate, characterize, and monitor hydrocarbon producing reservoirs. The company operates through three segments: Oil and Gas Markets, Adjacent Markets, and Emerging Markets. The Oil and Gas Markets segment offers wireless seismic data acquisition systems and reservoir characterization products and services, as well as traditional seismic exploration products, such as geophones, hydrophones, leader wires, connectors, cables, marine streamer retrieval and steering devices, and other seismic products. The Adjacent Markets segment provides industrial products, including imaging equipment, water meter products, remote shut-off valves, and Internet of Things platform, as well as seismic sensors for vibration monitoring and geotechnical applications, such as mine safety and earthquake detection applications; and electronic pre-press products that employ direct thermal imaging, direct-to-screen printing systems, and digital inkjet printing technologies targeted at the commercial and industrial graphics, textile, and flexographic printing industries. The Emerging Markets segment designs and sells products used for border and perimeter security surveillance, cross-border tunneling detection, and other products targeted at movement monitoring, intrusion detection, and situational awareness. This segment serves various agencies of the United States government, including the Department of Defense, Department of Energy, Department of Homeland Security, and other agencies. The company operates in Asia, Canada, Europe, South America, the United States, and internationally. Geospace Technologies Corporation was founded in 1980 and is headquartered in Houston, Texas.

About Seadrill

Seadrill Ltd. engages in the provision of offshore drilling services to the oil and gas industry. It operates through the following segments: Floaters, Jack-up rigs, and Other. The Floaters segment encompasses drilling, completion, and maintenance of offshore exploration and production wells. the Jack-up Rigs segment includes drilling contracts relate to jack-up rigs for operations in harsh and benign environments in shallow water. The Other segment represents management services to third parties and related parties. The company was founded on May 10, 2005 and is headquartered in Hamilton, Bermuda.