Reviewing TPG (NASDAQ:TPG) and Virtus Investment Partners (NASDAQ:VRTS)

Virtus Investment Partners (NASDAQ:VRTS) and TPG (NASDAQ:TPG) are both finance companies, but which is the superior business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, dividends, risk, earnings, analyst recommendations, valuation and profitability.

Volatility & Risk

Virtus Investment Partners has a beta of 1.47, meaning that its share price is 47% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, TPG has a beta of 1.49, meaning that its share price is 49% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Virtus Investment Partners and TPG”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Virtus Investment Partners	$906.95 million	1.44	$121.75 million	$16.90	11.04
TPG	$2.54 billion	8.55	$80.09 million	($0.44)	-134.95

Virtus Investment Partners has higher earnings, but lower revenue than TPG. TPG is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Virtus Investment Partners, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Profitability

This table compares Virtus Investment Partners and TPG’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Virtus Investment Partners	13.42%	21.56%	5.27%
TPG	0.69%	23.45%	7.85%

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent recommendations for Virtus Investment Partners and TPG, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Virtus Investment Partners	2	1	1	0	1.75
TPG	0	7	5	0	2.42

Virtus Investment Partners currently has a consensus target price of $225.75, indicating a potential upside of 20.95%. TPG has a consensus target price of $64.27, indicating a potential upside of 8.24%. Given Virtus Investment Partners’ higher possible upside, equities analysts clearly believe Virtus Investment Partners is more favorable than TPG.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

80.5% of Virtus Investment Partners shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 94.0% of TPG shares are held by institutional investors. 6.1% of Virtus Investment Partners shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 76.5% of TPG shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Dividends

Virtus Investment Partners pays an annual dividend of $9.00 per share and has a dividend yield of 4.8%. TPG pays an annual dividend of $2.12 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.6%. Virtus Investment Partners pays out 53.3% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. TPG pays out -481.8% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Both companies have healthy payout ratios and should be able to cover their dividend payments with earnings for the next several years.

Summary

TPG beats Virtus Investment Partners on 10 of the 16 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Virtus Investment Partners

Virtus Investment Partners, Inc. is a publicly owned investment manager. The firm primarily provides its services to individual and institutional clients. It launches separate client focused equity and fixed income portfolios. The firm launches equity, fixed income, and balanced mutual funds for its clients. It invests in the public equity, fixed income, and real estate markets. The firm also invests in exchange traded funds. It employs a multi manager approach for its products. The firm employs quantitative analysis to make its investments. It benchmarks the performance of its portfolios against the S&P 500 Index. The firm conducts in-house research to make its investments. Virtus Investment Partners, Inc. was founded in 1988 and is based in Hartford, Connecticut.

About TPG

TPG Inc. operates as an alternative asset manager in the United States and internationally. The company offers investment management services to TPG Funds, limited partners, and other vehicles. It also offers monitoring services to portfolio companies; advisory, debt and equity arrangement, and underwriting and placement services; and capital structuring and other advisory services to portfolio companies. In addition, the company invests in private equity funds, real estate funds, hedge funds, and credit funds. TPG Inc. was founded in 1992 and is based in Fort Worth, Texas. The company operates as a subsidiary of TPG GP A, LLC.