ATA (NASDAQ:AACG) and Coursera (NYSE:COUR) Head-To-Head Review

ATA (NASDAQ:AACG) and Coursera (NYSE:COUR) are both small-cap consumer discretionary companies, but which is the better business? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their earnings, analyst recommendations, dividends, risk, valuation, profitability and institutional ownership.

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of current ratings and recommmendations for ATA and Coursera, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
ATA	1	0	0	0	1.00
Coursera	1	4	7	0	2.50

Coursera has a consensus price target of $8.55, indicating a potential upside of 69.35%. Given Coursera’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe Coursera is more favorable than ATA.

Profitability

This table compares ATA and Coursera’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
ATA	-17.96%	-90.86%	-10.89%
Coursera	-15.39%	-1.72%	-1.07%

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares ATA and Coursera”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
ATA	$38.34 million	0.97	-$6.87 million	($0.20)	-4.30
Coursera	$757.50 million	1.76	-$51.00 million	($0.67)	-7.53

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

Insider & Institutional Ownership

0.7% of ATA shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 89.5% of Coursera shares are held by institutional investors. 52.9% of ATA shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 16.3% of Coursera shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Volatility and Risk

ATA has a beta of 1.13, indicating that its share price is 13% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Coursera has a beta of 1.26, indicating that its share price is 26% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Coursera beats ATA on 10 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About ATA

ATA Creativity Global, together with its subsidiaries, provides educational services to individual students through its training center network in China and internationally. Its educational services include portfolio training, research-based learning, overseas study counselling, in-school art classes through cooperation with high schools and training organizations, foreign language training services, junior art education, and other related educational services to its students. The company also offers online courses for students. It provides its services through partnership with sales channels, internet and mobile advertisement, word of mouth referral, and marketing events and activities. The company was formerly known as ATA Inc. and changed its name to ATA Creativity Global in September 2019. ATA Creativity Global was founded in 1999 and is headquartered in Hefei, China.

About Coursera

Coursera, Inc. operates an online educational content platform in the United States, Europe, Africa, the Asia Pacific, the Middle East, and internationally. It operates in three segments: Consumer, Enterprise, and Degrees. The company offers guided projects, courses, and specializations, as well as online degrees; and certificates for entry-level professional, non-entry level professional, university, and MasterTrack. It offers its products to individuals, enterprise, business, campus, and government. The company was formerly known as Dkandu, Inc. and changed its name to Coursera, Inc. in April 2012. Coursera, Inc. was incorporated in 2011 and is headquartered in Mountain View, California.