Critical Analysis: AvePoint (NASDAQ:AVPT) vs. SurgePays (NASDAQ:SURG)

AvePoint (NASDAQ:AVPT) and SurgePays (NASDAQ:SURG) are both computer and technology companies, but which is the better business? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, risk, institutional ownership, valuation, dividends, earnings and profitability.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent ratings and target prices for AvePoint and SurgePays, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
AvePoint	0	6	10	0	2.63
SurgePays	1	1	1	0	2.00

AvePoint presently has a consensus target price of $17.11, suggesting a potential upside of 70.40%. SurgePays has a consensus target price of $5.00, suggesting a potential upside of 655.29%. Given SurgePays’ higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe SurgePays is more favorable than AvePoint.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

44.5% of AvePoint shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 6.9% of SurgePays shares are owned by institutional investors. 22.7% of AvePoint shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 30.5% of SurgePays shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Risk and Volatility

AvePoint has a beta of 1.2, suggesting that its stock price is 20% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, SurgePays has a beta of 0.54, suggesting that its stock price is 46% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares AvePoint and SurgePays’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
AvePoint	8.34%	8.19%	5.06%
SurgePays	-83.42%	-967.32%	-232.66%

Earnings and Valuation

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

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
AvePoint	$419.50 million	5.16	$34.80 million	$0.16	62.75
SurgePays	$56.96 million	0.29	-$45.73 million	($1.81)	-0.37

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

Summary

AvePoint beats SurgePays on 12 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About AvePoint

AvePoint, Inc. provides cloud-native data management software platform in North America, Europe, Middle East, Africa, and Asia Pacific. It also offers software-as-a-service solutions and productivity applications. The company offers modularity and cloud services architecture to address critical challenges and the management of data to organizations that leverage third-party cloud vendors, including Microsoft, Salesforce, Google, AWS, Box, DropBox, and others; license and support; and maintenance services. AvePoint, Inc. was incorporated in 2001 and is headquartered in Jersey City, New Jersey.

About SurgePays

SurgePays, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, operates as a financial technology and telecom company in the United States. It operates through three segments: Mobile Virtual Network Operators, Comprehensive Platform Services, and Lead Generation. The company offers subsidized and non-subsidized mobile virtual network operators for internet connectivity through mobile broadband services to consumers; ACH banking relationships and fintech transactions platform to convenience stores; wireless top-up transactions and wireless product aggregation; and lead generation and case management solutions primarily to law firms in the mass tort industry, as well as call center activities. SurgePays, Inc. is headquartered in Bartlett, Tennessee.