Reviewing Hanover Bancorp (NASDAQ:HNVR) & Princeton Bancorp (NASDAQ:BPRN)

Hanover Bancorp (NASDAQ:HNVR) and Princeton Bancorp (NASDAQ:BPRN) are both small-cap finance companies, but which is the superior stock? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, valuation, earnings, analyst recommendations, profitability, risk and dividends.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of current recommendations and price targets for Hanover Bancorp and Princeton Bancorp, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Hanover Bancorp	1	3	1	0	2.00
Princeton Bancorp	0	2	1	1	2.75

Hanover Bancorp presently has a consensus price target of $24.33, suggesting a potential upside of 0.84%. Princeton Bancorp has a consensus price target of $37.50, suggesting a potential upside of 4.69%. Given Princeton Bancorp’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Princeton Bancorp is more favorable than Hanover Bancorp.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

15.0% of Hanover Bancorp shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 43.4% of Princeton Bancorp shares are held by institutional investors. 24.4% of Hanover Bancorp shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 23.1% of Princeton Bancorp 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.

Risk and Volatility

Hanover Bancorp has a beta of 0.11, indicating that its stock price is 89% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Princeton Bancorp has a beta of 0.49, indicating that its stock price is 51% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Dividends

Hanover Bancorp pays an annual dividend of $0.40 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.7%. Princeton Bancorp pays an annual dividend of $1.40 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.9%. Hanover Bancorp pays out 38.1% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Princeton Bancorp pays out 49.0% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Both companies have healthy payout ratios and should be able to cover their dividend payments with earnings for the next several years.

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Hanover Bancorp and Princeton Bancorp”s revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Hanover Bancorp	$143.32 million	1.21	$7.49 million	$1.05	22.98
Princeton Bancorp	$139.02 million	1.75	$18.61 million	$2.86	12.52

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

Profitability

This table compares Hanover Bancorp and Princeton Bancorp’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Hanover Bancorp	5.53%	5.09%	0.42%
Princeton Bancorp	14.20%	7.20%	0.86%

Summary

Princeton Bancorp beats Hanover Bancorp on 12 of the 16 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Hanover Bancorp

Hanover Bancorp, Inc., a bank holding company for Hanover Community Bank, provides personal and business lending and deposit services to businesses, municipalities, and individuals in the New York metro area. The company offers checking, credit cards, debit cards, money market, savings, government and municipal banking, and professional services, as well as time deposits, including certificate of deposit and individual retirement accounts. It also provides business loans, commercial real estate financing, small business administration, lending directory services, and residential mortgage. In addition, the company offers cash management, online and mobile banking, merchant services, and digital solutions. Its banking offices are located in Nassau, Suffolk, Queens, Kings, New York Counties, New York, Monmouth County, Freehold, and New Jersey. The company was founded in 2008 and is headquartered in Mineola, New York.

About Princeton Bancorp

Princeton Bancorp, Inc. operates as the bank holding company for The Bank of Princeton that provides various banking products and services. It accepts various deposit products, including checking, savings, attorney trust, and money market accounts, as well as certificates of deposit. The company also offers traditional retail banking services, one-to-four-family residential mortgage loans, multi-family and commercial mortgage loans, construction loans, and commercial business loans, as well as consumer loans, including home equity loans and lines of credit. In addition, it provides debit and credit cards, and money orders, direct deposit, automated teller machines, cashier's checks, safe deposit boxes, online banking, wire transfers, night depository, remote deposit capture, bank-by-mail, online, and automated telephone banking services, as well as payroll-related services and merchant credit card processing services. Further, the company offers full on-line statements, on-line bill payment, account inquiries, mobile banking, transaction histories and details, and account-to-account transfer services. Princeton Bancorp, Inc. was founded in 2007 and is headquartered in Princeton, New Jersey.