Contrasting SoFi Technologies (NASDAQ:SOFI) and Upbound Group (NASDAQ:UPBD)

SoFi Technologies (NASDAQ:SOFI) and Upbound Group (NASDAQ:UPBD) are both finance companies, but which is the better stock? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, risk, earnings, profitability, valuation, dividends and institutional ownership.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

38.4% of SoFi Technologies shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 90.3% of Upbound Group shares are held by institutional investors. 2.5% of SoFi Technologies shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 1.2% of Upbound Group shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of current ratings and target prices for SoFi Technologies and Upbound Group, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
SoFi Technologies	3	10	8	0	2.24
Upbound Group	1	2	2	0	2.20

SoFi Technologies presently has a consensus price target of $22.42, indicating a potential upside of 24.12%. Upbound Group has a consensus price target of $30.67, indicating a potential upside of 59.56%. Given Upbound Group’s higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe Upbound Group is more favorable than SoFi Technologies.

Profitability

This table compares SoFi Technologies and Upbound Group’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
SoFi Technologies	14.78%	6.22%	1.22%
Upbound Group	1.90%	34.53%	7.69%

Risk & Volatility

SoFi Technologies has a beta of 2.17, indicating that its stock price is 117% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Upbound Group has a beta of 1.79, indicating that its stock price is 79% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares SoFi Technologies and Upbound Group”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
SoFi Technologies	$3.61 billion	6.46	$481.32 million	$0.48	37.62
Upbound Group	$4.70 billion	0.24	$73.24 million	$1.54	12.48

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

Summary

SoFi Technologies beats Upbound Group on 8 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About SoFi Technologies

SoFi Technologies, Inc. provides various financial services in the United States, Latin America, and Canada. It operates through three segments: Lending, Technology Platform, and Financial Services. The company offers lending and financial services and products that allows its members to borrow, save, spend, invest, and protect money. It offers personal loans, student loans, home loans, and related services. The company also operates Galileo, a technology platform that offers services to financial and non-financial institution; and Technisys, a cloud-native digital and core banking platform with financial services customers. In addition, it provides SoFi Money offers checking and savings accounts, debit cards, and cash management products; and SoFi Invest, a mobile-first investment platform that provides access to trading and advisory solutions, such as investing and robo-advisory. Further, the company offers SoFi Credit Card that provides cash backs on every purchase; Sofi Relay, a personal finance management product that allows to track all of their financial accounts comprising credit score and spending behaviors; SoFi Protect, which offers insurance product; SoFi Travel, an application that manages travel search and booking experience; SoFi At Work provides financial benefits to employees, including student loan payments made on their employees' behalf; Lantern Credit, a financial services marketplace platform for seeking alternative products and provide product comparisons; and other lending as a service that offers pre-qualified borrower referrals and sells loans to third-party partner. The company was founded in 2011 and is based in San Francisco, California.

About Upbound Group

Upbound Group, Inc. leases household durable goods to customers on a lease-to-own basis in the United States, Puerto Rico, and Mexico. It operates through four segments: Rent-A-Center, Acima, Mexico, and Franchising. The company's brands, such as Rent-A-Center and Acima that facilitate consumer transactions across a range of store-based and virtual channels. It offers furniture comprising mattresses, tires, consumer electronics, appliances, tools, handbags, computers, smartphones, and accessories. It also provides merchandise on an installment sales basis; and the lease-to-own transaction to consumers who do not qualify for traditional financing, the lease to-own transaction through staffed or unstaffed kiosks located in third-party retailer's locations, and other virtual options. It operates retail installment sales stores under the Get It Now and Home Choice names; lease-to-own and franchised lease-to-own stores under the Rent-A-Centre, ColorTyme, and RimTyme names; and company-owned stores and e-commerce platform through rentacenter.com. The company was formerly known as Rent-A-Center, Inc. and changed its name to Upbound Group, Inc. in February 2023. Upbound Group, Inc. was founded in 1960 and is based in Plano, Texas.