ZW Data Action Technologies (NASDAQ:CNET) versus FLUENT (NASDAQ:FLNT) Critical Comparison

FLUENT (NASDAQ:FLNT) and ZW Data Action Technologies (NASDAQ:CNET) are both small-cap business services companies, but which is the superior stock? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, valuation, analyst recommendations, earnings, profitability, risk and dividends.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares FLUENT and ZW Data Action Technologies”s gross revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
FLUENT	$254.62 million	0.24	-$29.28 million	($1.36)	-1.56
ZW Data Action Technologies	$15.44 million	0.40	-$3.76 million	($1.76)	-1.07

ZW Data Action Technologies has lower revenue, but higher earnings than FLUENT. FLUENT is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than ZW Data Action Technologies, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Volatility & Risk

FLUENT has a beta of 1.25, meaning that its stock price is 25% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, ZW Data Action Technologies has a beta of 0.8, meaning that its stock price is 20% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent ratings and target prices for FLUENT and ZW Data Action Technologies, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
FLUENT	0	1	0	0	2.00
ZW Data Action Technologies	1	0	0	0	1.00

FLUENT presently has a consensus price target of $3.00, indicating a potential upside of 41.51%. Given FLUENT’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities research analysts plainly believe FLUENT is more favorable than ZW Data Action Technologies.

Profitability

This table compares FLUENT and ZW Data Action Technologies’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
FLUENT	-11.69%	-97.82%	-24.66%
ZW Data Action Technologies	-50.16%	-100.39%	-39.07%

Insider & Institutional Ownership

23.3% of FLUENT shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 0.0% of ZW Data Action Technologies shares are held by institutional investors. 23.3% of FLUENT shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 12.2% of ZW Data Action Technologies shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Summary

FLUENT beats ZW Data Action Technologies on 10 of the 13 factors compared between the two stocks.

About FLUENT

Fluent, Inc. provides data-driven digital marketing services in the United States and internationally. The company operates through Fluent and All Other segments. It offers customer acquisition services by operating digital marketing campaigns, through which the company connects its advertiser clients with consumers. The company also delivers data and performance-based marketing executions to various consumer brands, direct marketers, and agencies across a range of industries, including financial products and services, media and entertainment, health and life sciences, retail and consumer, and staffing and recruitment. Fluent, Inc. was founded in 2010 and is headquartered in New York, New York.

About ZW Data Action Technologies

ZW Data Action Technologies Inc., through its subsidiaries, offers omni-channel advertising, precision marketing, and data analysis management systems in the People’s Republic of China. The company offers Internet advertising, precision marketing, and related data services to small and medium enterprises through its Internet portals, including 28.com and liansuo.com that provide advertisers with tools to build sales channels in the form of franchisees, sales agents, distributors, and/or resellers. It also develops and operates blockchain technology-based products and services, as well as blockchain-based SaaS services that provides one-stop blockchain-powered enterprise management solutions in forms of NFT generations, data record, share, and storage module subscriptions, etc. In addition, the company offers other e-commerce O2O advertising, and marketing and related value-added technical services. Additionally, it offers online-content production, distribution, promotion, and live streamer training and management services. The company was formerly known as ChinaNet Online Holdings, Inc. and changed its name to ZW Data Action Technologies Inc. in October 2020. Data Action Technologies Inc. was founded in 2003 and is based in Beijing, the People’s Republic of China.