Head-To-Head Contrast: Cardinal Infrastructure Group (CDNL) and Its Peers

Cardinal Infrastructure Group (NASDAQ:CDNL) is one of 191 public companies in the “Construction & Engineering” industry, but how does it contrast to its competitors? We will compare Cardinal Infrastructure Group to related businesses based on the strength of its dividends, risk, analyst recommendations, valuation, earnings, profitability and institutional ownership.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

48.3% of shares of all “Construction & Engineering” companies are owned by institutional investors. 61.7% of Cardinal Infrastructure Group shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 20.8% of shares of all “Construction & Engineering” companies 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.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Cardinal Infrastructure Group and its competitors revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Net Income	Price/Earnings Ratio
Cardinal Infrastructure Group	$456.05 million	$22.69 million	78.71
Cardinal Infrastructure Group Competitors	$9.38 billion	$447.61 million	-5,853.97

Cardinal Infrastructure Group’s competitors have higher revenue and earnings than Cardinal Infrastructure Group. Cardinal Infrastructure Group is trading at a higher price-to-earnings ratio than its competitors, indicating that it is currently more expensive than other companies in its industry.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent recommendations for Cardinal Infrastructure Group and its competitors, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Cardinal Infrastructure Group	1	1	3	0	2.40
Cardinal Infrastructure Group Competitors	824	3376	7191	346	2.60

Cardinal Infrastructure Group currently has a consensus price target of $52.33, indicating a potential upside of 20.89%. As a group, “Construction & Engineering” companies have a potential upside of 34.69%. Given Cardinal Infrastructure Group’s competitors stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe Cardinal Infrastructure Group has less favorable growth aspects than its competitors.

Profitability

This table compares Cardinal Infrastructure Group and its competitors’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Cardinal Infrastructure Group	N/A	N/A	N/A
Cardinal Infrastructure Group Competitors	-3.96%	10.85%	4.21%

Summary

Cardinal Infrastructure Group competitors beat Cardinal Infrastructure Group on 9 of the 12 factors compared.

About Cardinal Infrastructure Group

We provide a comprehensive suite of infrastructure services to the residential, commercial, industrial, municipal, and state infrastructure markets. Our operations leverage a large highly skilled workforce and a fleet of specialized equipment to deliver wet utility installations (water, sewer, and stormwater systems), as well as grading, site clearing, erosion control, drilling and blasting, paving, and other related site services. We are becoming the platform of choice for a diverse array of infrastructure construction projects in our target geographies that require high-level technical expertise and sophistication. We seek to safely execute site work solutions within both the individual project’s schedule and budget, while strengthening our relationships with our growing list of customers. We believe we are one of the fastest-growing, full-service turnkey infrastructure services companies in the Southeastern United States. We deliver our suite of comprehensive infrastructure services that support the planning, preparation, installation, and development of residential, commercial, industrial, municipal, and state infrastructure projects primarily through in-house teams and equipment, significantly reducing the need for outsourcing or subcontractors which enables industry-leading project execution. Led by an experienced, long-tenured management team and supported by talented project managers, we are driven by a culture of safety and employee development. Our high-level expertise, technical sophistication, and expedited delivery of services result in strong margins. We believe we are well positioned to continue growing our revenue and profitability in a very fragmented and highly attractive industry. The Southeastern United States is one of the fastest-growing regions with respect to population and job growth. The three distinct and attractive markets in which we primarily operate today (the greater Charlotte, Raleigh, and Greensboro areas of North Carolina) have experienced a combined annual population growth of 6.6% from 2020 to 2024, compared to 2.6% for the rest of the United States. Our footprint is strategically aligned with the North Carolina Research Triangle, which houses numerous educational institutions and knowledge-sector companies that are among the core drivers of job growth in the state. In 2024, North Carolina issued approximately nine new housing permits per 1,000 residents, compared to about four new permits per 1,000 residents for the United States overall. We maintain deep, long-standing relationships with a diverse customer base, including some of the largest regional and national home builders, as well as general contractors supporting commercial and industrial construction. We believe these relationships enable us to consistently win new contracts and expand both within our current markets and into new geographies. We are already fully integrated within our Raleigh market and are completing integration buildouts in our other markets. We believe this significantly reduces wait times between each phase of construction, minimizes timeline risk, and increases the likelihood of successful execution. As the first step in the construction process, customers highly value our speed of delivery, quality of work, and reputation for excellence, which results in recurring business and better margins. Our dedication to proven processes, technology, and safety has enabled our strong growth and reputation. For the nine months ended September 30, 2025, we generated revenue of approximately $310.2 million, supported by a robust backlog of approximately $646.0 million at September 30, 2025, compared to revenue of approximately $230.3 million for the nine months ended September 30, 2024. For the year ended December 31, 2024, we generated revenue of approximately $315.2 million, supported by a robust backlog of approximately $512 million at December 31, 2024, compared to revenue of approximately $248.0 million for the year ended December 31, 2023 and a backlog of approximately $401 million at December 31, 2023. Cardinal NC was founded in 2013 by Jeremy Spivey, our Chief Executive Officer, in Raleigh, North Carolina. We originated as a niche provider of wet utilities installation and have, over time, both organically and through acquisitions, added capabilities, including grading, site clearing, erosion control, drilling and blasting, paving, and related site services, to become a full-service, end-to-end provider of turnkey infrastructure services. Acquisitions have been an integral part of our growth since our founding, and we believe they account for approximately 27% of our growth since 2013. We have completed six acquisitions to date. We deepened our presence within the Raleigh market through the acquisition of Harrelson Utility Repair & Contracting Inc. in 2021 and G. Goodwin Enterprises, LLC in 2022. We subsequently expanded into the Charlotte area through the acquisition of Monroe Roadways, Inc. in July 2023 and Purcell Construction, Inc. in January 2025. In 2024, we expanded into the Greensboro market organically, and in May 2025, we acquired Page & Associates, Inc., a local provider based in Greensboro. In October 2025, we acquired Red Clay Industries, Inc., a provider of asphalt paving, concrete contracting, concrete reclamation and soil stabilization in North Carolina. Our principal executive offices are located in Raleigh, NC.