Reviewing Stantec (NYSE:STN) & Gartner (NYSE:IT)

Stantec (NYSE:STN) and Gartner (NYSE:IT) are both large-cap business services companies, but which is the superior stock? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their valuation, risk, profitability, institutional ownership, dividends, earnings and analyst recommendations.

Risk and Volatility

Stantec has a beta of 1.03, meaning that its share price is 3% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Gartner has a beta of 1.19, meaning that its share price is 19% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of current ratings for Stantec and Gartner, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Stantec	0	0	7	0	3.00
Gartner	2	6	4	0	2.17

Gartner has a consensus target price of $311.67, indicating a potential upside of 34.24%. Given Gartner’s higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Gartner is more favorable than Stantec.

Profitability

This table compares Stantec and Gartner’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Stantec	5.62%	19.03%	8.04%
Gartner	19.71%	82.63%	13.58%

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Stantec and Gartner”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Stantec	$7.99 billion	1.38	$263.82 million	$3.04	31.69
Gartner	$6.46 billion	2.59	$1.25 billion	$11.40	20.37

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

Insider and Institutional Ownership

63.9% of Stantec shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 91.5% of Gartner shares are held by institutional investors. 0.5% of Stantec shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 2.3% of Gartner shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Summary

Gartner beats Stantec on 10 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Stantec

Stantec Inc. provides professional services in the areas of infrastructure and facilities to the public and private sectors in Canada, the United States, and internationally. It offers evaluation, planning, and designing infrastructure solutions; solutions for sustainable water resources, planning, management, and infrastructure; environmental services; integrated architecture, engineering, interior design, and planning solutions for buildings; and energy and resources solutions. The company also provides consulting services in engineering, architecture, interior design, landscape architecture, surveying, environmental sciences, project management, and project economics. In addition, it offers planning and design services to clients in residential, logistics, retail, infrastructure, energy, higher education, and urban regeneration sectors; architectural and interior design, and planning services in the science and technology, commercial workplace, higher education, residential, and hospitality markets. Further, the company provides transportation advisory, transport engineering, and technical design; project delivery consultancy services for mining, resources, and industrial infrastructure projects; paleontological and archaeological services for the rail, transportation, water, and power and energy sectors; and environmental and cultural resource compliance services. Additionally, it offers consulting services in sustainable building design, energy infrastructure upgrades, sustainable district heating network, and e-mobility; and planning, design, construction administration, commissioning, maintenance, decommissioning, and remediation services. The company was formerly known as Stanley Technology Group Inc. and changed its name to Stantec Inc. in October 1998. Stantec Inc. was founded in 1954 and is headquartered in Edmonton, Canada.

About Gartner

Gartner, Inc. operates as a research and advisory company in the United States, Canada, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and internationally. It operates through three segments: Research, Conferences, and Consulting. The Research segment delivers its research primarily through a subscription service that include on-demand access to published research content, data and benchmarks, and direct access to a network of research experts. The Conferences segment offers executives and teams in an organization the opportunity to learn, share, and network. The Consulting segment offers market-leading research, custom analysis, and on-the-ground support services. This segment also offers actionable solutions for IT-related priorities, including IT cost optimization, digital transformation, and IT sourcing optimization. Gartner, Inc. was founded in 1979 and is headquartered in Stamford, Connecticut.