Werner Enterprises (NASDAQ:WERN) versus Lyft (NASDAQ:LYFT) Head-To-Head Comparison

Lyft (NASDAQ:LYFT) and Werner Enterprises (NASDAQ:WERN) are both mid-cap industrials companies, but which is the better business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their risk, valuation, dividends, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, earnings and profitability.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of recent ratings and target prices for Lyft and Werner Enterprises, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Lyft	2	26	11	0	2.23
Werner Enterprises	3	8	4	1	2.19

Lyft presently has a consensus target price of $19.47, indicating a potential upside of 30.65%. Werner Enterprises has a consensus target price of $41.54, indicating a potential upside of 19.40%. Given Lyft’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, research analysts clearly believe Lyft is more favorable than Werner Enterprises.

Risk & Volatility

Lyft has a beta of 1.83, suggesting that its stock price is 83% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Werner Enterprises has a beta of 1.27, suggesting that its stock price is 27% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Lyft and Werner Enterprises”s revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Lyft	$6.32 billion	0.89	$2.84 billion	$6.88	2.17
Werner Enterprises	$2.97 billion	0.70	-$14.40 million	($0.76)	-45.78

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

Profitability

This table compares Lyft and Werner Enterprises’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Lyft	42.32%	-1.20%	-0.36%
Werner Enterprises	-1.42%	1.18%	0.52%

Institutional & Insider Ownership

83.1% of Lyft shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 89.3% of Werner Enterprises shares are held by institutional investors. 0.9% of Lyft shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 1.3% of Werner Enterprises shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Summary

Lyft beats Werner Enterprises on 10 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Lyft

Lyft, Inc. operates a peer-to-peer marketplace for on-demand ridesharing in the United States and Canada. It operates multimodal transportation networks that offer access to various transportation options through the Lyft platform and mobile-based applications. The company's platform provides a ridesharing marketplace, which connects drivers with riders; Express Drive, a car rental program for drivers; and a network of shared bikes and scooters in various cities to address the needs of riders for short trips. It also offers centralized tools and enterprise transportation solutions, such as concierge transportation solutions for organizations; Lyft Pink subscription plans; Lyft Pass commuter programs; first-mile and last-mile services; and university safe rides programs. The company was formerly known as Zimride, Inc. and changed its name to Lyft, Inc. in April 2013. Lyft, Inc. was incorporated in 2007 and is headquartered in San Francisco, California.

About Werner Enterprises

Werner Enterprises, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, engages in transporting truckload shipments of general commodities in interstate and intrastate commerce in the United States, Mexico, and internationally. The company operates through two segments, Truckload Transportation Services and Werner Logistics. The Truckload Transportation Services segment operates a fleet of medium-to-long-haul vans that transports various consumer nondurable products and other commodities in truckload quantities using dry van trailers; the expedited fleet, which offers time-sensitive truckload services using driver teams; a regional short-haul fleet that provides truckload van service in the United States; and temperature-controlled fleet, which offers truckload services for temperature-sensitive products using temperature-controlled trailers. This segment provides truckload services to retail distribution centers or manufacturing facilities using dry vans or trailers to transport retail store merchandise, consumer products, food and beverage products, and manufactured products. As of December 31, 2023, it had a fleet of 8,000 trucks, which included 7,740 company-operated, as well as 260 owned and operated by independent contractors; and 30,810 trailers that comprised dry vans, flatbeds, temperature-controlled, and other trailers. The Werner Logistics segment provides non-asset-based transportation and logistics services, including truck brokerage; logistics management services and solutions; rail transportation through alliances with rail and drayage providers; and residential and commercial deliveries of large or heavy items using liftgate straight trucks. As of December 31, 2023, this segment operated 35 drayage tractors and 115 delivery trucks. It also sells used trucks and trailers; and trades used trucks to original equipment manufacturers. The company was founded in 1956 and is headquartered in Omaha, Nebraska.