Applied Digital (NASDAQ:APLD) and NerdWallet (NASDAQ:NRDS) Critical Analysis

Applied Digital (NASDAQ:APLD) and NerdWallet (NASDAQ:NRDS) are both finance companies, but which is the better investment? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their risk, dividends, profitability, valuation, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations and earnings.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current ratings for Applied Digital and NerdWallet, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Applied Digital	0	0	9	0	3.00
NerdWallet	0	1	4	0	2.80

Applied Digital currently has a consensus target price of $12.11, suggesting a potential upside of 21.72%. NerdWallet has a consensus target price of $17.20, suggesting a potential upside of 23.03%. Given NerdWallet’s higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe NerdWallet is more favorable than Applied Digital.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

65.7% of Applied Digital shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 38.8% of NerdWallet shares are owned by institutional investors. 11.8% of Applied Digital shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 45.9% of NerdWallet shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Profitability

This table compares Applied Digital and NerdWallet’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Applied Digital	-127.86%	-117.67%	-27.84%
NerdWallet	-1.65%	-2.90%	-2.45%

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Applied Digital and NerdWallet”s revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Applied Digital	$165.57 million	13.40	-$149.27 million	($1.73)	-5.75
NerdWallet	$599.40 million	1.71	-$11.80 million	($0.14)	-99.85

NerdWallet has higher revenue and earnings than Applied Digital. NerdWallet is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Applied Digital, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Volatility and Risk

Applied Digital has a beta of 4.77, meaning that its stock price is 377% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, NerdWallet has a beta of 1.33, meaning that its stock price is 33% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

NerdWallet beats Applied Digital on 8 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Applied Digital

Applied Digital Corporation designs, develops, and operates datacenters in North America. Its datacenters provide digital infrastructure solutions to the high-performance computing industry. The company also provides artificial intelligence cloud services, high performance computing datacenter hosting, and crypto datacenter hosting services. The company was formerly known as Applied Blockchain, Inc. and changed its name to Applied Digital Corporation in November 2022. Applied Digital Corporation is based in Dallas, Texas.

About NerdWallet

NerdWallet, Inc. operates a digital platform that provides consumer-driven advice about personal finance by connecting individuals and small and mid-sized businesses with financial products providers in the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, and Canada. Its platform offers guidance to consumers through educational content, tools and calculators, and product marketplaces, as well as through NerdWallet app for various financial products, including credit cards, mortgages, insurance, SMB products, personal loans, banking, investing, and student loans. The company was founded in 2009 and is based in San Francisco, California.