KDDI (OTCMKTS:KDDIY) and TeliaSonera (OTCMKTS:TLSNY) Head to Head Comparison

TeliaSonera (OTCMKTS:TLSNY) and KDDI (OTCMKTS:KDDIY) are both large-cap communication services companies, but which is the better investment? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their risk, earnings, analyst recommendations, dividends, profitability, institutional ownership and valuation.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of recent ratings and recommmendations for TeliaSonera and KDDI, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
TeliaSonera	1	2	0	1	2.25
KDDI	0	0	0	2	4.00

Dividends

TeliaSonera pays an annual dividend of $0.20 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.0%. KDDI pays an annual dividend of $0.29 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.6%. TeliaSonera pays out 71.4% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. KDDI pays out 23.0% 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.

Profitability

This table compares TeliaSonera and KDDI’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
TeliaSonera	6.54%	9.82%	2.83%
KDDI	N/A	N/A	N/A

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares TeliaSonera and KDDI”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
TeliaSonera	$8.28 billion	2.40	$360.26 million	$0.28	36.11
KDDI	$40.34 billion	1.79	$4.67 billion	$1.26	14.26

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

Institutional and Insider Ownership

0.1% of KDDI shares are held by institutional investors. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Risk & Volatility

TeliaSonera has a beta of 0.36, meaning that its share price is 64% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, KDDI has a beta of 0.09, meaning that its share price is 91% less volatile than the S&P 500.

About TeliaSonera

Telia Company AB (publ) provides communication services to businesses, individuals, families, and communities in Sweden, Finland, Norway, Denmark, Lithuania, Estonia, and Latvia. It offers mobile, broadband, television, and fixed-line services; and networking, cloud and security, mobility, enterprise mobile network, contact center, managed mobility services, collaboration solutions, enterprise telephony, Internet of Things (IoT), carrier ethernet, dedicated internet access, wavelengths, IP Transit, dark fiber, and colocation solutions. The company also provides IoT connectivity, building monitoring, smart public transport, and smart utilities, as well as transport and logistics solutions comprising connected vehicle, asset tracking, and fleet management services. It markets its products and services under the Telia, Telia Cygate, TV4, C More, Halebop, Fello, MTV, Phonero, Onecall, MyCall, CallMe, MIT Tele, Ezys, Diil, Super, and Imt brand names for transport and logistics, public transport, manufacturing, retail, utilities, buildings and real estate, and public sector industries. The company was formerly known as TeliaSonera AB (publ) and changed its name to Telia Company AB (publ) in April 2016. Telia Company AB (publ) was founded in 1853 and is based in Solna, Sweden.

About KDDI

KDDI Corporation provides telecommunications services in Japan and internationally. It operates in two segments, Personal Services and Business Services. The Personal Services segment offers telecommunication services and other services such as finance, energy, and LX through its multi-brands au, UQ mobile, and povo. The Business Services segment offers smartphones and other devices, network and cloud services, and data center services to corporate customers under the TELEHOUSE brand. The company was incorporated in 1984 and is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan.