Reviewing Abacus Life (NASDAQ:ABL) and Jackson Financial (NYSE:JXN)

Abacus Life (NASDAQ:ABL) and Jackson Financial (NYSE:JXN) are both finance companies, but which is the better investment? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, profitability, analyst recommendations, dividends, valuation, earnings and risk.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

90.0% of Jackson Financial shares are held by institutional investors. 47.0% of Abacus Life shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 1.6% of Jackson Financial shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Profitability

This table compares Abacus Life and Jackson Financial’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Abacus Life	5.62%	16.90%	8.24%
Jackson Financial	1.73%	15.73%	0.46%

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of recent ratings for Abacus Life and Jackson Financial, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Abacus Life	1	0	2	1	2.75
Jackson Financial	1	4	1	1	2.29

Abacus Life currently has a consensus target price of $12.67, suggesting a potential upside of 90.91%. Jackson Financial has a consensus target price of $108.80, suggesting a potential upside of 11.01%. Given Abacus Life’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities research analysts clearly believe Abacus Life is more favorable than Jackson Financial.

Volatility and Risk

Abacus Life has a beta of -0.02, meaning that its stock price is 102% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Jackson Financial has a beta of 1.45, meaning that its stock price is 45% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Abacus Life and Jackson Financial”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Abacus Life	$111.92 million	5.79	-$23.96 million	$0.08	82.94
Jackson Financial	$4.75 billion	1.40	$946.00 million	$7.23	13.56

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

Summary

Abacus Life beats Jackson Financial on 9 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Abacus Life

Abacus Life, Inc. operates as an alternative asset manager specializing in life insurance products. It purchases life insurance policies from consumers seeking liquidity and manages policies over time via trading, holding, and/or servicing. The company was founded in 2004 and is based in Orlando, Florida.

About Jackson Financial

Jackson Financial Inc., through its subsidiaries, provides suite of annuities to retail investors in the United States. The company operates through three segments: Retail Annuities, Institutional Products, and Closed Life and Annuity Blocks. The Retail Annuities segment offers various retirement income and savings products, including variable, fixed index, fixed, and payout annuities, as well as registered index-linked annuities and lifetime income solutions. The Institutional Products segment provides traditional guaranteed investment contracts; funding agreements comprising agreements issued in conjunction with its participation in the U.S. federal home loan bank program; and medium-term funding agreement-backed notes. The Closed Life and Annuity Blocks segment offers various protection products, such as whole life, universal life, variable universal life, and term life insurance products, as well as fixed, fixed index, and payout annuities; and a block of group payout annuities. The company also offers investment management services. It sells its products through a distribution network that includes independent broker-dealers, wirehouses, regional broker-dealers, banks, independent registered investment advisors, third-party platforms, and insurance agents. The company was formerly known as Brooke (Holdco1) Inc. and changed its name to Jackson Financial Inc. in July 2020. Jackson Financial Inc. was incorporated in 2006 and is headquartered in Lansing, Michigan.