Reviewing Ageas (OTCMKTS:AGESY) and MetLife (NYSE:MET)

Ageas (OTCMKTS:AGESY) and MetLife (NYSE:MET) are both large-cap finance companies, but which is the superior stock? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their dividends, risk, profitability, institutional ownership, earnings, analyst recommendations and valuation.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Ageas and MetLife”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Ageas	$14.68 billion	0.93	$1.21 billion	N/A	N/A
MetLife	$70.80 billion	0.72	$4.43 billion	$5.31	14.49

MetLife has higher revenue and earnings than Ageas.

Profitability

This table compares Ageas and MetLife’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Ageas	N/A	N/A	N/A
MetLife	5.83%	19.88%	0.82%

Dividends

Ageas pays an annual dividend of $3.91 per share and has a dividend yield of 5.7%. MetLife pays an annual dividend of $2.27 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.0%. MetLife pays out 42.7% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. MetLife has increased its dividend for 12 consecutive years.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current recommendations and price targets for Ageas and MetLife, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Ageas	0	0	0	0	0.00
MetLife	0	2	9	1	2.92

MetLife has a consensus price target of $94.60, suggesting a potential upside of 22.94%. Given MetLife’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe MetLife is more favorable than Ageas.

Risk and Volatility

Ageas has a beta of 0.61, suggesting that its stock price is 39% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, MetLife has a beta of 0.87, suggesting that its stock price is 13% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

95.0% of MetLife shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.4% of MetLife shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Summary

MetLife beats Ageas on 13 of the 16 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Ageas

ageas SA/NV, together with its subsidiaries, engages in insurance business. It operates in five segments: Belgium, Europe, Asia, Reinsurance, and General Account. The company offers property, casualty, and life insurance products, as well as pension products; and reinsurance products. It provides life insurance products include risks related to the life and death of individuals; and non-life insurance products comprise accident and health, motor, fire, and other property insurance products, as well as insurance services for other damages to property. The company serves private individuals, as well as small, medium-sized, and large companies through independent brokers and the bank channels. ageas SA/NV was founded in 1824 and is headquartered in Brussels, Belgium.

About MetLife

MetLife, Inc., a financial services company, provides insurance, annuities, employee benefits, and asset management services worldwide. It operates through six segments: Retirement and Income Solutions; Group Benefits; Asia; Latin America; Europe, the Middle East and Africa; and MetLife Holdings. The company offers life, dental, group short-and long-term disability, individual disability, pet insurance, accidental death and dismemberment, vision, and accident and health coverages, as well as prepaid legal plans; administrative services-only arrangements to employers; and general and separate account, and synthetic guaranteed interest contracts, as well as private floating rate funding agreements. It also provides pension risk transfers, institutional income annuities, structured settlements, and capital markets investment products; and other products and services, such as life insurance products and funding agreements for funding postretirement benefits, as well as company, bank, or trust-owned life insurance used to finance nonqualified benefit programs for executives. In addition, it provides fixed, indexed-linked, and variable annuities; pension products; regular savings products; whole and term life, endowments, universal and variable life, and group life products; longevity reinsurance solutions; credit insurance products; and protection against long-term health care services. MetLife, Inc. was incorporated in 1999 and is based in New York, New York.