ADTRAN (NASDAQ:ADTN) and Calix (NYSE:CALX) Critical Survey

ADTRAN (NASDAQ:ADTN) and Calix (NYSE:CALX) are both technology companies, but which is the superior investment? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, valuation, institutional ownership, dividends, profitability, earnings and risk.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current recommendations and price targets for ADTRAN and Calix, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
ADTRAN	1	2	4	0	2.43
Calix	0	2	5	0	2.71

ADTRAN currently has a consensus target price of $14.67, indicating a potential upside of 124.60%. Calix has a consensus target price of $57.40, indicating a potential upside of 56.19%. Given ADTRAN’s higher possible upside, equities analysts plainly believe ADTRAN is more favorable than Calix.

Earnings & Valuation

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

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
ADTRAN	$1.14 billion	0.47	-$45.66 million	($0.28)	-23.32
Calix	$1.00 billion	2.31	$17.88 million	$0.74	49.66

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

Profitability

This table compares ADTRAN and Calix’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
ADTRAN	-2.29%	14.24%	1.66%
Calix	4.61%	6.17%	4.90%

Risk & Volatility

ADTRAN has a beta of 1.48, suggesting that its share price is 48% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Calix has a beta of 1.32, suggesting that its share price is 32% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

80.6% of ADTRAN shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 98.1% of Calix shares are owned by institutional investors. 2.2% of ADTRAN shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 17.4% of Calix shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Summary

Calix beats ADTRAN on 10 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About ADTRAN

ADTRAN Holdings, Inc., through its subsidiaries, provides networking and communications platforms, software, systems, and services in the United States, Germany, the United Kingdom, and internationally. It operates through two segments, Network Solutions, and Services & Support. It offers residential gateways; ethernet passive optical network ONUs; gigabit passive optical network/XGS-PON ONTs; traditional SSE, routers, and switches; edge cloud; carrier ethernet network interface devices; Optical Line Terminals; Packet Aggregation, Copper Access, and Oscilloquartz; optical transport and engine solutions; infrastructure monitoring solution; and training, professional, software, and managed services. The company also provides various software, such as Mosaic One SaaS, n-Command, Procloud, MCP, AOE and ACI-E, and Ensemble Controller. It serves large, medium, and small service providers; alternative service providers, such as utilities, municipalities and fiber overbuilders; cable/MSOs; and SMBs and distributed enterprises. ADTRAN Holdings, Inc. was incorporated in 1985 and is headquartered in Huntsville, Alabama.

About Calix

Calix, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, engages in the provision of cloud and software platforms, and systems and services in the United States, rest of Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Asia Pacific. Its cloud and software platforms, and systems and services enable broadband service providers (BSPs) to provide a range of services. The company provides Calix Cloud platform, a role-based analytics platform comprising Calix Engagement Cloud, Calix Service Cloud, and Calix Operations Cloud, which are configurable to display role-based insights and enable BSPs to anticipate and target new revenue-generating services and applications through mobile application, such as CommandIQ for residents and CommandWorx for businesses; Calix Intelligent Access EDGE, an access network solution for automated and intelligent networks; and Calix Revenue EDGE, a premises solution for subscriber managed services. It also offers SmartLife managed services, including SmartHome managed services and applications to enhance, operate and secure the connected experience of subscribers in their home; SmartTown managed services that reimagine community Wi-Fi as a ubiquitous, secure, and managed experience across a BSP's footprint; and SmartBiz managed services that address the business networking and productivity needs of business owners with an all-in-one managed service. In addition, the company provides Wi-Fi systems under GigaSpire and GigaPro brands to be ready for deployment as a complete subscriber experience solution for BSP's residential and business subscribers. It offers its products through its direct sales force and resellers. The company was incorporated in 1999 and is headquartered in San Jose, California.