Franklin BSP Realty Trust (NYSE:FBRT) and DigitalBridge Group (NYSE:DBRG) Financial Comparison

Franklin BSP Realty Trust (NYSE:FBRT) and DigitalBridge Group (NYSE:DBRG) are both finance companies, but which is the superior business? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their dividends, risk, analyst recommendations, profitability, earnings, institutional ownership and valuation.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent ratings and target prices for Franklin BSP Realty Trust and DigitalBridge Group, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Franklin BSP Realty Trust	0	2	3	0	2.60
DigitalBridge Group	1	7	1	0	2.00

Franklin BSP Realty Trust currently has a consensus price target of $11.50, indicating a potential upside of 23.86%. DigitalBridge Group has a consensus price target of $16.00, indicating a potential upside of 2.93%. Given Franklin BSP Realty Trust’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, research analysts clearly believe Franklin BSP Realty Trust is more favorable than DigitalBridge Group.

Profitability

This table compares Franklin BSP Realty Trust and DigitalBridge Group’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Franklin BSP Realty Trust	24.26%	6.46%	1.34%
DigitalBridge Group	N/A	3.89%	1.86%

Risk and Volatility

Franklin BSP Realty Trust has a beta of 0.94, indicating that its share price is 6% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, DigitalBridge Group has a beta of 1.5, indicating that its share price is 50% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Franklin BSP Realty Trust and DigitalBridge Group”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Franklin BSP Realty Trust	$498.69 million	1.43	$82.27 million	$0.51	18.21
DigitalBridge Group	$98.58 million	28.76	$141.87 million	$0.49	31.72

DigitalBridge Group has lower revenue, but higher earnings than Franklin BSP Realty Trust. Franklin BSP Realty Trust is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than DigitalBridge Group, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Dividends

Franklin BSP Realty Trust pays an annual dividend of $0.80 per share and has a dividend yield of 8.6%. DigitalBridge Group pays an annual dividend of $0.04 per share and has a dividend yield of 0.3%. Franklin BSP Realty Trust pays out 156.9% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. DigitalBridge Group pays out 8.2% of its earnings in the form of a dividend.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

59.9% of Franklin BSP Realty Trust shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 92.7% of DigitalBridge Group shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.4% of Franklin BSP Realty Trust shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 3.6% of DigitalBridge Group shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

About Franklin BSP Realty Trust

Benefit Street Partners operates as a self-managed real estate investment trust (REIT). BSP earns income from investing in a leveraged portfolio of residential mortgage pass-through securities consisting almost exclusively of adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) securities issued and guaranteed by government-sponsored enterprises, either Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae) or Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (Freddie Mac) (together, the government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs)), or by an agency of the federal government, Government National Mortgage Association (Ginnie Mae). BSP’s investment strategy focuses on managing a portfolio of residential mortgage investments consisting almost exclusively of ARM Agency Securities. As of December 31, 2012, the Company’s securities consisted of Agency Securities classified as available-for-sale and Residential mortgage securities classified as held-to-maturity.

About DigitalBridge Group

DigitalBridge is an infrastructure investment firm specializing in digital infrastructure assets. They provide services to institutional investors. They primarily invest in data centers, cell towers, fiber networks, small cells, and edge infrastructure. DigitalBridge Group, Inc. was founded in 1991 and is headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida with additional offices in Los Angles, California, and New York New York.