Hilltop (HTH) Competitors

AXIS Capital (NYSE:AXS) and Hilltop (NYSE:HTH) are both mid-cap finance companies, but which is the superior business? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, risk, analyst recommendations, earnings, valuation, profitability, community ranking, media sentiment and dividends.

Is AXS or HTH more profitable?

AXIS Capital has a net margin of 18.16% compared to Hilltop's net margin of 7.04%. AXIS Capital's return on equity of 18.89% beat Hilltop's return on equity.

Company	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
AXIS Capital	18.16%	18.89%	3.05%
Hilltop	7.04%	5.18%	0.71%

Do institutionals & insiders hold more shares of AXS or HTH?

93.4% of AXIS Capital shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 57.1% of Hilltop shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.5% of AXIS Capital shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 29.3% of Hilltop shares are owned by 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.

Which has more volatility & risk, AXS or HTH?

AXIS Capital has a beta of 0.95, meaning that its stock price is 5% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Hilltop has a beta of 1.14, meaning that its stock price is 14% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Does the MarketBeat Community favor AXS or HTH?

AXIS Capital received 130 more outperform votes than Hilltop when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 54.53% of users gave AXIS Capital an outperform vote while only 52.71% of users gave Hilltop an outperform vote.

Company	Underperform	Outperform
AXIS Capital	Outperform Votes 373 54.53%	Underperform Votes 311 45.47%
Hilltop	Outperform Votes 243 52.71%	Underperform Votes 218 47.29%

Do analysts rate AXS or HTH?

AXIS Capital currently has a consensus price target of $99.25, indicating a potential upside of 9.83%. Hilltop has a consensus price target of $34.00, indicating a potential upside of 9.98%. Given Hilltop's higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe Hilltop is more favorable than AXIS Capital.

Company	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
AXIS Capital	0 Sell rating(s)	3 Hold rating(s)	6 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.67
Hilltop	1 Sell rating(s)	2 Hold rating(s)	0 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	1.67

Is AXS or HTH a better dividend stock?

AXIS Capital pays an annual dividend of $1.76 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.9%. Hilltop pays an annual dividend of $0.68 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.2%. AXIS Capital pays out 14.3% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Hilltop pays out 39.1% 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 stronger valuation and earnings, AXS or HTH?

AXIS Capital has higher revenue and earnings than Hilltop. AXIS Capital is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Hilltop, 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
AXIS Capital	$5.96B	1.27	$1.08B	$12.35	7.32
Hilltop	$1.61B	1.25	$113.21M	$1.74	17.77

Does the media refer more to AXS or HTH?

In the previous week, AXIS Capital had 10 more articles in the media than Hilltop. MarketBeat recorded 36 mentions for AXIS Capital and 26 mentions for Hilltop. Hilltop's average media sentiment score of 0.54 beat AXIS Capital's score of 0.51 indicating that Hilltop is being referred to more favorably in the news media.

Company	Very Positive	Positive	Neutral	Negative	Very Negative	Overall Sentiment
AXIS Capital	12 Very Positive mention(s)	6 Positive mention(s)	6 Neutral mention(s)	4 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Positive
Hilltop	6 Very Positive mention(s)	5 Positive mention(s)	10 Neutral mention(s)	1 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Positive

Summary

AXIS Capital beats Hilltop on 14 of the 20 factors compared between the two stocks.