Comparing Iron Mountain (NYSE:IRM) and OUTFRONT Media (NYSE:OUT)

OUTFRONT Media (NYSE:OUT) and Iron Mountain (NYSE:IRM) are both real estate companies, but which is the better business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, dividends, analyst recommendations, profitability, earnings, valuation and risk.

Volatility and Risk

OUTFRONT Media has a beta of 1.49, suggesting that its share price is 49% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Iron Mountain has a beta of 1.2, suggesting that its share price is 20% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Dividends

OUTFRONT Media pays an annual dividend of $1.20 per share and has a dividend yield of 4.0%. Iron Mountain pays an annual dividend of $3.46 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.8%. OUTFRONT Media pays out 86.3% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. Iron Mountain pays out 247.1% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. Iron Mountain has increased its dividend for 3 consecutive years. OUTFRONT Media is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares OUTFRONT Media and Iron Mountain”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
OUTFRONT Media	$1.83 billion	2.87	$147.00 million	$1.39	21.44
Iron Mountain	$6.90 billion	5.27	$144.59 million	$1.40	87.28

OUTFRONT Media has higher earnings, but lower revenue than Iron Mountain. OUTFRONT Media is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Iron Mountain, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of current ratings for OUTFRONT Media and Iron Mountain, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
OUTFRONT Media	0	1	6	0	2.86
Iron Mountain	0	1	5	0	2.83

OUTFRONT Media presently has a consensus target price of $34.00, suggesting a potential upside of 14.09%. Iron Mountain has a consensus target price of $135.17, suggesting a potential upside of 10.62%. Given OUTFRONT Media’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities analysts clearly believe OUTFRONT Media is more favorable than Iron Mountain.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

80.1% of Iron Mountain shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.5% of OUTFRONT Media shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 1.7% of Iron Mountain shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Profitability

This table compares OUTFRONT Media and Iron Mountain’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
OUTFRONT Media	12.66%	37.44%	4.65%
Iron Mountain	5.54%	-85.44%	3.30%

Summary

OUTFRONT Media beats Iron Mountain on 10 of the 17 factors compared between the two stocks.

About OUTFRONT Media

OUTFRONT Media, Inc. leases advertising space on out-of-home advertising structures and sites. Its inventory consists of billboard displays, which are primarily located on the most heavily traveled highways & roadways, and transit advertising displays operated under exclusive multi-year contracts with municipalities in large cities across the U.S. and Canada. It operates through the U.S. Media and other segments. The U.S. Media segment includes U.S. Billboard and Transit. The company was founded in 1938 and is headquartered in New York, NY.

About Iron Mountain

Iron Mountain Incorporated (NYSE: IRM) is a global leader in information management services. Founded in 1951 and trusted by more than 240,000 customers worldwide, Iron Mountain serves to protect and elevate the power of our customers’ work. Through a range of offerings including digital transformation, data centers, secure records storage, information management, asset lifecycle management, secure destruction and art storage and logistics, Iron Mountain helps businesses bring light to their dark data, enabling customers to unlock value and intelligence from their stored digital and physical assets at speed and with security, while helping them meet their environmental goals.