Critical Review: Meridian (MRDN) & Its Rivals

Meridian (NASDAQ:MRDN) is one of 382 publicly-traded companies in the “Hotels, Restaurants & Leisure” industry, but how does it contrast to its peers? We will compare Meridian to similar businesses based on the strength of its dividends, risk, valuation, institutional ownership, profitability, analyst recommendations and earnings.

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Meridian and its peers top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Net Income	Price/Earnings Ratio
Meridian	$182.86 million	-$89.90 million	-0.95
Meridian Competitors	$3.43 billion	$250.18 million	-158.74

Meridian’s peers have higher revenue and earnings than Meridian. Meridian is trading at a higher price-to-earnings ratio than its peers, indicating that it is currently more expensive than other companies in its industry.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

2.7% of Meridian shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 48.7% of shares of all “Hotels, Restaurants & Leisure” companies are owned by institutional investors. 9.9% of Meridian shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 22.1% of shares of all “Hotels, Restaurants & Leisure” companies are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Profitability

This table compares Meridian and its peers’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Meridian	-41.41%	-117.87%	-58.87%
Meridian Competitors	8.57%	-41.62%	2.16%

Volatility & Risk

Meridian has a beta of 0.73, suggesting that its stock price is 27% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Meridian’s peers have a beta of 1.68, suggesting that their average stock price is 68% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current ratings for Meridian and its peers, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Meridian	1	0	0	0	1.00
Meridian Competitors	3819	17310	25633	908	2.50

Meridian currently has a consensus price target of $21.60, suggesting a potential upside of 238.03%. As a group, “Hotels, Restaurants & Leisure” companies have a potential upside of 58.27%. Given Meridian’s higher possible upside, research analysts plainly believe Meridian is more favorable than its peers.

Summary

Meridian peers beat Meridian on 11 of the 13 factors compared.

About Meridian

Meridian Holdings Inc is engaged in the online gaming and betting business, providing sports betting, online casino, and gaming operations across multiple jurisdictions in Europe, Africa, and Central and South America. The company has three reportable segments: MeridianBet Group, GMAG, and RKings & CFAC. The MeridianBet Group segment includes retail and online sports betting, casinos, and related gaming operations. The GMAG segment focuses on the resale of third-party gaming content, mainly serving customers in the Asia-Pacific region.