Head to Head Comparison: Virtus Investment Partners (NASDAQ:VRTS) and Blue Owl Capital (NYSE:OWL)

Blue Owl Capital (NYSE:OWL) and Virtus Investment Partners (NASDAQ:VRTS) are both finance companies, but which is the superior business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, earnings, valuation, dividends, profitability, risk and analyst recommendations.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

35.8% of Blue Owl Capital shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 80.5% of Virtus Investment Partners shares are owned by institutional investors. 25.7% of Blue Owl Capital shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 6.4% of Virtus Investment Partners shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Profitability

This table compares Blue Owl Capital and Virtus Investment Partners’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Blue Owl Capital	N/A	N/A	N/A
Virtus Investment Partners	13.42%	21.56%	5.27%

Dividends

Blue Owl Capital pays an annual dividend of $0.92 per share and has a dividend yield of 9.9%. Virtus Investment Partners pays an annual dividend of $9.80 per share and has a dividend yield of 8.1%. Blue Owl Capital pays out 766.7% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. Virtus Investment Partners pays out 55.8% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Blue Owl Capital has increased its dividend for 4 consecutive years. Blue Owl Capital is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current ratings and price targets for Blue Owl Capital and Virtus Investment Partners, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Blue Owl Capital	0	9	7	1	2.53
Virtus Investment Partners	3	1	1	0	1.60

Blue Owl Capital currently has a consensus target price of $13.27, suggesting a potential upside of 42.46%. Virtus Investment Partners has a consensus target price of $129.75, suggesting a potential upside of 7.52%. Given Blue Owl Capital’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities analysts clearly believe Blue Owl Capital is more favorable than Virtus Investment Partners.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares Blue Owl Capital and Virtus Investment Partners”s revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Blue Owl Capital	$2.99 billion	4.86	$187.09 million	$0.12	77.62
Virtus Investment Partners	$819.58 million	0.98	$121.75 million	$17.55	6.88

Blue Owl Capital has higher revenue and earnings than Virtus Investment Partners. Virtus Investment Partners is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Blue Owl Capital, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Volatility and Risk

Blue Owl Capital has a beta of 1.35, suggesting that its share price is 35% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Virtus Investment Partners has a beta of 1.41, suggesting that its share price is 41% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Blue Owl Capital beats Virtus Investment Partners on 11 of the 18 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Blue Owl Capital

Blue Owl Capital Inc. operates as an asset manager in the United States. The company offers permanent capital base solutions that enables it to offer holistic framework of capital solutions to middle market companies, large alternative asset managers, and corporate real estate owners and tenants. It also provides direct lending products that offer private credit products comprising diversified, technology, first lien, and opportunistic lending to middle-market companies; liquid credit; GP strategic capital products, which offers capital solutions, including GP minority stakes, GP debt financing, and professional sports minority stakes; and real estate products that focuses on acquiring triple net lease real estate by investment grade or creditworthy tenants. It offers its solutions through permanent capital vehicles, as well as long-dated private funds. Blue Owl Capital Inc. is headquartered in New York, New York.

About Virtus Investment Partners

Virtus Investment Partners, Inc. is a publicly owned investment manager. The firm primarily provides its services to individual and institutional clients. It launches separate client focused equity and fixed income portfolios. The firm launches equity, fixed income, and balanced mutual funds for its clients. It invests in the public equity, fixed income, and real estate markets. The firm also invests in exchange traded funds. It employs a multi manager approach for its products. The firm employs quantitative analysis to make its investments. It benchmarks the performance of its portfolios against the S&P 500 Index. The firm conducts in-house research to make its investments. Virtus Investment Partners, Inc. was founded in 1988 and is based in Hartford, Connecticut.