Critical Analysis: Uniti Group (NASDAQ:UNIT) vs. GCI Liberty, Inc. – Series C GCI Group (NASDAQ:GLIBK)

Uniti Group (NASDAQ:UNIT) and GCI Liberty, Inc. – Series C GCI Group (NASDAQ:GLIBK) are both communication services companies, but which is the better stock? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their risk, earnings, valuation, profitability, dividends, institutional ownership and analyst recommendations.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent ratings and price targets for Uniti Group and GCI Liberty, Inc. – Series C GCI Group, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Uniti Group	0	7	1	1	2.33
GCI Liberty, Inc. – Series C GCI Group	2	0	0	0	1.00

Uniti Group currently has a consensus target price of $10.92, suggesting a potential upside of 7.34%. Given Uniti Group’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, equities research analysts plainly believe Uniti Group is more favorable than GCI Liberty, Inc. – Series C GCI Group.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Uniti Group and GCI Liberty, Inc. – Series C GCI Group”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Uniti Group	$2.23 billion	1.10	$1.30 billion	$2.71	3.75
GCI Liberty, Inc. – Series C GCI Group	$1.05 billion	0.90	-$309.00 million	($11.25)	-2.34

Uniti Group has higher revenue and earnings than GCI Liberty, Inc. – Series C GCI Group. GCI Liberty, Inc. – Series C GCI Group is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Uniti Group, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Risk and Volatility

Uniti Group has a beta of 1.39, suggesting that its share price is 39% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, GCI Liberty, Inc. – Series C GCI Group has a beta of -1.02, suggesting that its share price is 202% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares Uniti Group and GCI Liberty, Inc. – Series C GCI Group’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Uniti Group	28.68%	-133.07%	-4.09%
GCI Liberty, Inc. – Series C GCI Group	-32.53%	11.56%	5.78%

Institutional and Insider Ownership

87.5% of Uniti Group shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.9% of Uniti Group shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Summary

Uniti Group beats GCI Liberty, Inc. – Series C GCI Group on 13 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Uniti Group

Uniti Group, Inc. is a real estate investment trust company, which engages in the acquisition, construction, and leasing of properties. It operates through the following business segments: Uniti Leasing, Uniti Fiber, and Corporate. The Uniti Leasing segment involves mission-critical communications assets on exclusive or shared-tenant basis, and dark fiber network. The Uniti Fiber segment includes the operation of infrastructure solutions, cell site backhauls, and dark fiber. The Corporate segment consists of office and shared service functions. The company was founded in February 2014 and is headquartered in Little Rock, AR.

About GCI Liberty, Inc. – Series C GCI Group

GCI Liberty Inc. consists of its wholly owned subsidiary GCI. The company is communications provider, providing data, voice and managed services to consumer and business customers throughout Alaska. GCI Liberty Inc. is based in ENGLEWOOD, Colo.