Head to Head Review: Recruit (RCRUY) vs. Its Competitors

Recruit (OTCMKTS:RCRUY) is one of 205 publicly-traded companies in the “Professional Services” industry, but how does it weigh in compared to its competitors? We will compare Recruit to similar businesses based on the strength of its valuation, risk, earnings, profitability, dividends, institutional ownership and analyst recommendations.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

57.5% of shares of all “Professional Services” companies are held by institutional investors. 17.1% of shares of all “Professional Services” companies are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Profitability

This table compares Recruit and its competitors’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Recruit	14.94%	36.40%	21.05%
Recruit Competitors	-0.87%	17.41%	4.16%

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current ratings and price targets for Recruit and its competitors, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Recruit	0	1	0	0	2.00
Recruit Competitors	1497	6361	9105	484	2.49

As a group, “Professional Services” companies have a potential upside of 37.94%. Given Recruit’s competitors stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Recruit has less favorable growth aspects than its competitors.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Recruit and its competitors gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Net Income	Price/Earnings Ratio
Recruit	$24.56 billion	$3.28 billion	38.77
Recruit Competitors	$3.35 billion	$227.10 million	26.55

Recruit has higher revenue and earnings than its competitors. Recruit is trading at a higher price-to-earnings ratio than its competitors, indicating that it is currently more expensive than other companies in its industry.

Dividends

Recruit pays an annual dividend of $0.02 per share and has a dividend yield of 0.1%. Recruit pays out 3.8% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. As a group, “Professional Services” companies pay a dividend yield of 2.7% and pay out -158.8% of their earnings in the form of a dividend. Recruit lags its competitors as a dividend stock, given its lower dividend yield and higher payout ratio.

Volatility & Risk

Recruit has a beta of 1.7, suggesting that its stock price is 70% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Recruit’s competitors have a beta of 0.95, suggesting that their average stock price is 5% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Recruit competitors beat Recruit on 8 of the 15 factors compared.

About Recruit

Recruit Holdings Co., Ltd. provides HR technology and business solutions that transforms the world of work. It operates through three segments: HR Technology, Matching & Solutions, and Staffing. The HR Technology segment provides various technological solutions that help job seekers and employers in navigating hiring and recruitment. The Matching & Solutions segment offers HR solutions that support business clients’ recruiting and hiring activities and individual users’ job search activities through its job advertising services and placement services. This segment also provides marketing solutions that provide matching platforms for businesses in various industries, including housing and real estate, beauty, bridal, travel, dining, and others, as well as SaaS solutions, which are business and management support tools for small and medium-sized companies. The Staffing segment provides temporary staffing services in Japan, Europe, the United States, and Australia. Recruit Holdings Co., Ltd. operates in more than 60 countries. The company was formerly known as Recruit Co., Ltd. and changed its name to Recruit Holdings Co., Ltd. in October 2012. Recruit Holdings Co., Ltd. was founded in 1960 and is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan.