Nelnet (NNI) Competitors

Nelnet (NYSE:NNI) and SLM (NASDAQ:SLM) are both mid-cap finance companies, but which is the better business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their profitability, media sentiment, valuation, risk, earnings, community ranking, dividends, analyst recommendations and institutional ownership.

Does the MarketBeat Community prefer NNI or SLM?

SLM received 228 more outperform votes than Nelnet when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 69.28% of users gave SLM an outperform vote while only 66.50% of users gave Nelnet an outperform vote.

Company	Underperform	Outperform
Nelnet	Outperform Votes 266 66.50%	Underperform Votes 134 33.50%
SLM	Outperform Votes 494 69.28%	Underperform Votes 219 30.72%

Do analysts recommend NNI or SLM?

Nelnet currently has a consensus target price of $98.00, indicating a potential downside of 10.86%. SLM has a consensus target price of $27.90, indicating a potential downside of 2.35%. Given SLM's stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe SLM is more favorable than Nelnet.

Company	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Nelnet	0 Sell rating(s)	1 Hold rating(s)	0 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.00
SLM	0 Sell rating(s)	2 Hold rating(s)	8 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.80

Do insiders & institutionals have more ownership in NNI or SLM?

33.5% of Nelnet shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 98.9% of SLM shares are held by institutional investors. 50.1% of Nelnet shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 1.2% of SLM shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Which has higher earnings & valuation, NNI or SLM?

SLM has lower revenue, but higher earnings than Nelnet. SLM is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Nelnet, 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
Nelnet	$2.06B	1.93	$91.53M	$3.04	36.16
SLM	$1.90B	3.19	$581.39M	$2.87	9.95

Is NNI or SLM more profitable?

SLM has a net margin of 22.18% compared to Nelnet's net margin of 5.54%. SLM's return on equity of 35.92% beat Nelnet's return on equity.

Company	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Nelnet	5.54%	3.78%	0.80%
SLM	22.18%	35.92%	2.29%

Does the media prefer NNI or SLM?

In the previous week, SLM had 11 more articles in the media than Nelnet. MarketBeat recorded 13 mentions for SLM and 2 mentions for Nelnet. SLM's average media sentiment score of 0.37 beat Nelnet's score of 0.00 indicating that SLM is being referred to more favorably in the news media.

Company	Very Positive	Positive	Neutral	Negative	Very Negative	Overall Sentiment
Nelnet	0 Very Positive mention(s)	0 Positive mention(s)	2 Neutral mention(s)	0 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Neutral
SLM	3 Very Positive mention(s)	3 Positive mention(s)	6 Neutral mention(s)	1 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Neutral

Is NNI or SLM a better dividend stock?

Nelnet pays an annual dividend of $1.12 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.0%. SLM pays an annual dividend of $0.52 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.8%. Nelnet pays out 36.8% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. SLM pays out 18.1% 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. SLM is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.

Which has more risk & volatility, NNI or SLM?

Nelnet has a beta of 0.91, indicating that its stock price is 9% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, SLM has a beta of 1.21, indicating that its stock price is 21% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

SLM beats Nelnet on 16 of the 20 factors compared between the two stocks.