Digital Realty Trust (NYSE:DLR) vs. Smartstop Self Storage REIT (NYSE:SMA) Head-To-Head Comparison

Digital Realty Trust (NYSE:DLR) and Smartstop Self Storage REIT (NYSE:SMA) are both real estate companies, but which is the better stock? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, dividends, earnings, valuation, profitability, risk and institutional ownership.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current ratings for Digital Realty Trust and Smartstop Self Storage REIT, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Digital Realty Trust	0	6	25	1	2.84
Smartstop Self Storage REIT	1	3	4	2	2.70

Digital Realty Trust presently has a consensus target price of $218.16, indicating a potential upside of 14.56%. Smartstop Self Storage REIT has a consensus target price of $36.56, indicating a potential upside of 7.77%. Given Digital Realty Trust’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, equities research analysts clearly believe Digital Realty Trust is more favorable than Smartstop Self Storage REIT.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Digital Realty Trust and Smartstop Self Storage REIT”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Digital Realty Trust	$6.11 billion	11.53	$1.31 billion	$2.06	92.44
Smartstop Self Storage REIT	$281.14 million	6.68	-$1.55 million	$0.51	66.52

Digital Realty Trust has higher revenue and earnings than Smartstop Self Storage REIT. Smartstop Self Storage REIT is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Digital Realty Trust, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Dividends

Digital Realty Trust pays an annual dividend of $4.88 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.6%. Smartstop Self Storage REIT pays an annual dividend of $1.63 per share and has a dividend yield of 4.8%. Digital Realty Trust pays out 236.9% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. Smartstop Self Storage REIT pays out 319.6% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future.

Risk and Volatility

Digital Realty Trust has a beta of 1.03, suggesting that its share price is 3% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Smartstop Self Storage REIT has a beta of 0.5, suggesting that its share price is 50% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares Digital Realty Trust and Smartstop Self Storage REIT’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Digital Realty Trust	11.80%	3.34%	1.59%
Smartstop Self Storage REIT	9.68%	2.33%	1.23%

Insider & Institutional Ownership

99.7% of Digital Realty Trust shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.2% of Digital Realty Trust shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 5.7% of Smartstop Self Storage REIT shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Summary

Digital Realty Trust beats Smartstop Self Storage REIT on 14 of the 17 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Digital Realty Trust

Digital Realty Trust, Inc. operates as a real estate investment trust, which engages in the provision of data center, colocation and interconnection solutions. It serves the following industries: artificial intelligence (AI), networks, cloud, digital media, mobile, financial services, healthcare, and gaming. The company was founded on March 9, 2004, and is headquartered in Dallas, TX.

About Smartstop Self Storage REIT

Symmetry Medical Inc. (Symmetry) is a medical device solutions company, including surgical instruments, orthopedic implants, and sterilization cases and trays. The Company designs, develops and offers worldwide production and supply chain capabilities for these products to customers in the orthopedic industry, and other medical device markets (including but not limited to arthroscopy, dental, laparoscopy, osteobiologic, and endoscopy segments). It also manufactures specialized non-healthcare products, primarily in the aerospace industry. The Company operates in two segments: original equipment manufacturer (OEM) solutions and symmetry surgical. On August 15, 2011, the Company acquired PSC Industries, Inc’s Olsen Medical division. On December 29, 2011 it acquired the surgical instruments product portfolio from Codman & Shurtleff, Inc., a Johnson & Johnson Company.