BJ's Restaurants (BJRI) Competitors

Ruth's Hospitality Group (NASDAQ:RUTH) and BJ's Restaurants (NASDAQ:BJRI) are both small-cap consumer cyclical companies, but which is the better investment? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their profitability, dividends, community ranking, analyst recommendations, risk, institutional ownership, earnings, media sentiment and valuation.

Is RUTH or BJRI a better dividend stock?

Ruth's Hospitality Group pays an annual dividend of $0.64 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.0%. BJ's Restaurants pays an annual dividend of $0.52 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.5%. Ruth's Hospitality Group pays out 53.3% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. BJ's Restaurants pays out 41.6% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Both companies have healthy payout ratios and should be able to cover their dividend payments with earnings for the next several years.

Which has more risk and volatility, RUTH or BJRI?

Ruth's Hospitality Group has a beta of 1.82, meaning that its share price is 82% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, BJ's Restaurants has a beta of 2.1, meaning that its share price is 110% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Does the media refer more to RUTH or BJRI?

In the previous week, BJ's Restaurants had 6 more articles in the media than Ruth's Hospitality Group. MarketBeat recorded 7 mentions for BJ's Restaurants and 1 mentions for Ruth's Hospitality Group. BJ's Restaurants' average media sentiment score of 0.70 beat Ruth's Hospitality Group's score of 0.08 indicating that BJ's Restaurants is being referred to more favorably in the news media.

Company	Very Positive	Positive	Neutral	Negative	Very Negative	Overall Sentiment
Ruth's Hospitality Group	1 Very Positive mention(s)	0 Positive mention(s)	0 Neutral mention(s)	0 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Neutral
BJ's Restaurants	3 Very Positive mention(s)	0 Positive mention(s)	1 Neutral mention(s)	0 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Positive

Does the MarketBeat Community favor RUTH or BJRI?

BJ's Restaurants received 98 more outperform votes than Ruth's Hospitality Group when rated by MarketBeat users. However, 66.19% of users gave Ruth's Hospitality Group an outperform vote while only 54.71% of users gave BJ's Restaurants an outperform vote.

Company	Underperform	Outperform
Ruth's Hospitality Group	Outperform Votes 413 66.19%	Underperform Votes 211 33.81%
BJ's Restaurants	Outperform Votes 511 54.71%	Underperform Votes 423 45.29%

Do insiders & institutionals have more ownership in RUTH or BJRI?

87.3% of Ruth's Hospitality Group shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 99.9% of BJ's Restaurants shares are held by institutional investors. 6.0% of Ruth's Hospitality Group shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 4.9% of BJ's Restaurants shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Is RUTH or BJRI more profitable?

Ruth's Hospitality Group has a net margin of 7.66% compared to BJ's Restaurants' net margin of 2.24%. Ruth's Hospitality Group's return on equity of 32.00% beat BJ's Restaurants' return on equity.

Company	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Ruth's Hospitality Group	7.66%	32.00%	8.63%
BJ's Restaurants	2.24%	7.98%	2.86%

Do analysts rate RUTH or BJRI?

BJ's Restaurants has a consensus target price of $38.57, suggesting a potential upside of 7.71%. Given BJ's Restaurants' stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe BJ's Restaurants is more favorable than Ruth's Hospitality Group.

Company	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Ruth's Hospitality Group	0 Sell rating(s)	0 Hold rating(s)	0 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	0.00
BJ's Restaurants	1 Sell rating(s)	4 Hold rating(s)	2 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.14

Which has stronger earnings & valuation, RUTH or BJRI?

Ruth's Hospitality Group has higher earnings, but lower revenue than BJ's Restaurants. Ruth's Hospitality Group is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than BJ's Restaurants, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Company	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Ruth's Hospitality Group	$505.86M	1.36	$38.62M	$1.20	17.91
BJ's Restaurants	$1.34B	0.61	$19.66M	$1.25	28.65

Summary

BJ's Restaurants beats Ruth's Hospitality Group on 12 of the 20 factors compared between the two stocks.