Head to Head Review: Alarum Technologies (NASDAQ:ALAR) vs. Cardlytics (NASDAQ:CDLX)

Cardlytics (NASDAQ:CDLX) and Alarum Technologies (NASDAQ:ALAR) are both small-cap business services companies, but which is the better business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, earnings, risk, valuation, profitability, institutional ownership and dividends.

Valuation & Earnings

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

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Cardlytics	$278.30 million	0.26	-$189.30 million	($2.11)	-0.64
Alarum Technologies	$31.82 million	2.18	$5.78 million	$0.17	56.82

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

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of current ratings for Cardlytics and Alarum Technologies, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Cardlytics	1	3	0	0	1.75
Alarum Technologies	1	0	1	0	2.00

Cardlytics currently has a consensus target price of $2.25, indicating a potential upside of 67.29%. Alarum Technologies has a consensus target price of $22.00, indicating a potential upside of 127.74%. Given Alarum Technologies’ stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Alarum Technologies is more favorable than Cardlytics.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

68.1% of Cardlytics shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 3.2% of Alarum Technologies shares are owned by institutional investors. 4.4% of Cardlytics shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 2.7% of Alarum Technologies shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Volatility & Risk

Cardlytics has a beta of 1.05, indicating that its share price is 5% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Alarum Technologies has a beta of 1.42, indicating that its share price is 42% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares Cardlytics and Alarum Technologies’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Cardlytics	-44.12%	-235.70%	-31.31%
Alarum Technologies	3.28%	17.77%	13.68%

Summary

Alarum Technologies beats Cardlytics on 11 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Cardlytics

Cardlytics, Inc. operates an advertising platform in the United States and the United Kingdom. It offers Cardlytics platform, a proprietary native bank advertising channel that enables marketers to reach customers through their network of financial institution partners through digital channels, such as online, mobile applications, email, and various real-time notifications; and Bridg platform, a customer data platform which utilizes point-of-sale data and enables marketers to perform analytics and targeted loyalty marketing, as well as measure the impact of their marketing. The company was incorporated in 2008 and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia.

About Alarum Technologies

Alarum Technologies Ltd. provides internet access and web data collection solutions in North, South, and Central America, Europe, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. The company operates through two segments, Enterprise Internet Access Solutions and Consumer Internet Access Solutions. The company offers security blanket against ransomware, viruses, phishing, and other online threats, as well as secured and encrypted connection, masking the customers online activity and keeping them safe from hackers. It also provides privacy solutions and services, a software solution that uses an encryption protocol which is defined upon the process being used to generate a secured encrypted path and keep the users' data private and safe; and web data collection solution allows organizations to collect vast amounts of web and internet data by simultaneously connecting to the Internet from different IP addresses. In addition, the company offers static residential proxy network, rotating residential proxy network, data center proxy network, premium dedicated static residential proxies, mobile proxies, SERP data collection service, and social data collection service, as well as advertising services to enterprise customers. The company offers its products through resellers and internet service providers. It serves advertising and media companies, financial organizations, cyber security companies, industrial and commercial companies, online companies, education institutions, and AI recruitment market and other sectors. The company was formerly known as Safe-T Group Ltd. and changed its name to Alarum Technologies Ltd. in January 2023. Alarum Technologies Ltd. was founded in 2013 and is headquartered in Tel Aviv, Israel.