Contrasting Torrid (NYSE:CURV) and Yesway (NASDAQ:YSWY)

Yesway (NASDAQ:YSWY) and Torrid (NYSE:CURV) are both small-cap consumer discretionary companies, but which is the superior stock? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, valuation, analyst recommendations, earnings, profitability, risk and dividends.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent ratings and target prices for Yesway and Torrid, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Yesway	1	4	2	3	2.70
Torrid	2	5	1	0	1.88

Yesway presently has a consensus price target of $29.62, indicating a potential upside of 17.56%. Torrid has a consensus price target of $1.64, indicating a potential downside of 25.90%. Given Yesway’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities research analysts plainly believe Yesway is more favorable than Torrid.

Profitability

This table compares Yesway and Torrid’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Yesway	N/A	N/A	N/A
Torrid	-1.28%	N/A	-3.10%

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Yesway and Torrid”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Yesway	$2.67 billion	0.60	$13.27 million	$0.21	120.00
Torrid	$1.00 billion	0.22	-$7.03 million	($0.12)	-18.42

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

Insider & Institutional Ownership

81.8% of Torrid shares are held by institutional investors. 6.5% of Torrid shares are held by company 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.

Summary

Yesway beats Torrid on 11 of the 13 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Yesway

Yesway is a U.S.-based convenience store operator that has rapidly grown since its inception in 2015. We operate our portfolio primarily under two successful brands, Yesway and Allsup’s. Our sites are differentiated through a leading foodservice offering, featuring Allsup’s famous deep-fried burrito, and a wide variety of high-quality grocery items and private-label products. Our geographic footprint consists of stores located in attractive rural and suburban markets across the Southwest and Midwest, where we often are the convenience retail destination of choice and, effectively, the local grocer. We have a successful track record of growing through new store development and 27 acquisitions and believe we are well-positioned to continue to solidify our market position and grow our store count. — Established in 2015 by Brookwood, a leading real estate-focused private equity firm, Yesway was built from the ground up by a team of seasoned industry veterans who brought decades of expertise and best practices to the convenience retailing industry. By leveraging our deep real estate knowledge and prioritizing data-driven decision-making, we have assembled a portfolio of highly accessible, customer-friendly sites through a combination of new store construction and strategic acquisition activity. This approach has enabled us to expand our portfolio in both existing and new markets, build brand density, and evolve our store formats to better serve our communities. — Our disciplined strategy extends beyond real estate. We have refined our foodservice platform and enhanced operational performance across our portfolio, creating a retail experience that resonates with our customers. This has resulted in exceptional customer loyalty, evidenced by our track record of continued same-store sales growth over the past three years and successful openings of 90 new stores from 2020 through December 31, 2025. At the same time, we have embraced innovation in an industry that has historically been slow to adopt it. By investing in technology and software-driven automation, Yesway has achieved best-in-class reporting and performance monitoring, reduced labor costs through streamlined operations, enabled real-time data-driven decision-making, and enhanced the customer experience. Our success has not gone unnoticed. Over the years, Yesway has been widely recognized as an industry leader. We have been honored with numerous prestigious awards, including being named one of the fastest-growing chains in the convenience store industry by CS News, the “Breakout Retailer of the Year” by Chain Store Age, and the “Convenience Store Chain of the Year” by CStore Decisions. Yesway, Inc., was incorporated as a Delaware corporation on April 23, 2021. Our corporate headquarters are located in Fort Worth, TX.

About Torrid

Torrid Holdings Inc. operates in women’s plus-size apparel and intimates market in North America. The company designs, develops, and merchandises its products under the Torrid, Torrid Curve, CURV, and Lovesick brand names. It is involved in the sale of tops, bottoms, dresses, denims, activewear, intimates, sleep wear, swim wear, and outerwear products; and non-apparel products comprising accessories, footwear, and beauty products. The company sells its products directly to consumers through its e-commerce platform and its physical stores. Torrid Holdings Inc. was incorporated in 2019 and is headquartered in City Of Industry, California.