Head to Head Review: CIM Commercial Trust (NASDAQ:CMCT) and Global Self Storage (NASDAQ:SELF)

CIM Commercial Trust (NASDAQ:CMCT) and Global Self Storage (NASDAQ:SELF) are both small-cap finance companies, but which is the better stock? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, earnings, dividends, profitability, institutional ownership, risk and valuation.

Risk & Volatility

CIM Commercial Trust has a beta of 0.84, suggesting that its share price is 16% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Global Self Storage has a beta of 0.69, suggesting that its share price is 31% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares CIM Commercial Trust and Global Self Storage’s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
CIM Commercial Trust	$139.99 million	1.33	$345.67 million	($0.50)	-25.20
Global Self Storage	$8.67 million	4.29	$580,000.00	N/A	N/A

CIM Commercial Trust has higher revenue and earnings than Global Self Storage.

Profitability

This table compares CIM Commercial Trust and Global Self Storage’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
CIM Commercial Trust	-14.14%	-15.34%	-1.00%
Global Self Storage	-1.26%	-0.28%	-0.17%

Insider and Institutional Ownership

41.3% of CIM Commercial Trust shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 14.9% of Global Self Storage shares are owned by institutional investors. 19.4% of CIM Commercial Trust shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 6.9% of Global Self Storage shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current ratings and recommmendations for CIM Commercial Trust and Global Self Storage, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
CIM Commercial Trust	0	0	0	0	N/A
Global Self Storage	0	0	1	0	3.00

Global Self Storage has a consensus target price of $4.75, indicating a potential upside of 19.35%. Given Global Self Storage’s higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Global Self Storage is more favorable than CIM Commercial Trust.

Dividends

CIM Commercial Trust pays an annual dividend of $0.30 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.4%. Global Self Storage pays an annual dividend of $0.26 per share and has a dividend yield of 6.5%. CIM Commercial Trust pays out -60.0% of its earnings in the form of a dividend.

About CIM Commercial Trust

CIM Commercial is a real estate investment trust that primarily acquires, owns, and operates Class A and creative office assets in vibrant and improving metropolitan communities throughout the United States (including improving and developing such assets). Its properties are primarily located in Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area. CIM Commercial is operated by affiliates of CIM Group, L.P., a vertically-integrated owner and operator of real assets with multi-disciplinary expertise and in-house research, acquisition, credit analysis, development, finance, leasing, and onsite property management capabilities.

About Global Self Storage

Global Self Storage is a self-administered and self-managed REIT that owns, operates, manages, acquires, develops and redevelops self-storage properties. The company's self-storage properties are designed to offer affordable, easily accessible and secure storage space for residential and commercial customers. Through its wholly owned subsidiaries, the company owns and/or manages 13 self-storage properties in Connecticut, Illinois, Indiana, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, and Oklahoma.