Head to Head Comparison: POET Technologies (OTCMKTS:POETF) and GCT Semiconductor (NYSE:GCTS)

GCT Semiconductor (NYSE:GCTS) and POET Technologies (OTCMKTS:POETF) are both small-cap computer and technology 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.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

28.1% of GCT Semiconductor shares are held by institutional investors. 0.2% of GCT Semiconductor shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Profitability

This table compares GCT Semiconductor and POET Technologies’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
GCT Semiconductor	N/A	N/A	-27.81%
POET Technologies	N/A	-88.82%	-74.05%

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of current ratings for GCT Semiconductor and POET Technologies, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
GCT Semiconductor	0	0	1	0	3.00
POET Technologies	0	0	0	0	0.00

GCT Semiconductor presently has a consensus target price of $5.00, suggesting a potential upside of 279.25%. Given GCT Semiconductor’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities analysts clearly believe GCT Semiconductor is more favorable than POET Technologies.

Volatility & Risk

GCT Semiconductor has a beta of 1.24, suggesting that its share price is 24% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, POET Technologies has a beta of 0.81, suggesting that its share price is 19% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares GCT Semiconductor and POET Technologies”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
GCT Semiconductor	$9.13 million	6.97	-$2.00 million	($0.26)	-5.07
POET Technologies	$4.43 million	369.91	-$18.17 million	($0.05)	-89.80

GCT Semiconductor has higher revenue and earnings than POET Technologies. POET Technologies is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than GCT Semiconductor, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Summary

GCT Semiconductor beats POET Technologies on 11 of the 13 factors compared between the two stocks.

About GCT Semiconductor

GCT Semiconductor Holding, Inc., operates as a fabless semiconductor company, designs, develops, and markets integrated circuits for the wireless semiconductor industry. The company provides RF and modem chipsets based on 4G LTE technology, including 4G LTE, 4.5G LTE Advanced, and 4.75G LTE Advanced-Pro. It also develops and sells cellular IoT chipsets for low-speed mobile networks such as eMTC/NB-IOT/Sigfox, and other network protocols; and 5G solutions. Its products and solutions are used in smartphones, tablets, hotspots, CPEs, USB dongles, routers, and M2M applications. The company sells its products directly or indirectly through distributors to original equipment manufacturers and original design manufacturers primarily in Taiwan, China, Korea and Japan, Europe, North America and South America. The company was formerly known as Global Communication Technology, Inc. GCT Semiconductor Holding, Inc. was founded in 1998 and is headquartered in San Jose, California.

About POET Technologies

POET Technologies, Inc. engages in the designing, developing, manufacturing and sale of opto-electronic solutions for the sensing, data communications and telecommunications markets. It developed POET Optical Interposer platform, which allows the integration of electronic and photonic devices into a single multi-chip module. The company was founded on November 14, 1985 and is headquartered in Toronto, Canada.