Head to Head Comparison: Stantec (NYSE:STN) and Huron Consulting Group (NASDAQ:HURN)

Stantec (NYSE:STN) and Huron Consulting Group (NASDAQ:HURN) are both business services companies, but which is the superior investment? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, institutional ownership, profitability, earnings, dividends, risk and valuation.

Volatility & Risk

Stantec has a beta of 1.03, indicating that its stock price is 3% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Huron Consulting Group has a beta of 0.26, indicating that its stock price is 74% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares Stantec and Huron Consulting Group’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Stantec	5.01%	18.22%	7.61%
Huron Consulting Group	6.60%	25.52%	9.50%

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Stantec and Huron Consulting Group”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Stantec	$5.47 billion	2.26	$263.82 million	$2.42	44.87
Huron Consulting Group	$1.52 billion	1.39	$116.63 million	$5.73	21.29

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

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of recent ratings for Stantec and Huron Consulting Group, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Stantec	0	0	7	0	3.00
Huron Consulting Group	0	0	5	0	3.00

Huron Consulting Group has a consensus price target of $170.75, suggesting a potential upside of 39.98%. Given Huron Consulting Group’s higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe Huron Consulting Group is more favorable than Stantec.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

63.9% of Stantec shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 93.9% of Huron Consulting Group shares are held by institutional investors. 0.5% of Stantec shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 2.2% of Huron Consulting Group shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Summary

Huron Consulting Group beats Stantec on 7 of the 13 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Stantec

Stantec Inc. provides professional services in the areas of infrastructure and facilities to the public and private sectors in Canada, the United States, and internationally. It offers evaluation, planning, and designing infrastructure solutions; solutions for sustainable water resources, planning, management, and infrastructure; environmental services; integrated architecture, engineering, interior design, and planning solutions for buildings; and energy and resources solutions. The company also provides consulting services in engineering, architecture, interior design, landscape architecture, surveying, environmental sciences, project management, and project economics. In addition, it offers planning and design services to clients in residential, logistics, retail, infrastructure, energy, higher education, and urban regeneration sectors; architectural and interior design, and planning services in the science and technology, commercial workplace, higher education, residential, and hospitality markets. Further, the company provides transportation advisory, transport engineering, and technical design; project delivery consultancy services for mining, resources, and industrial infrastructure projects; paleontological and archaeological services for the rail, transportation, water, and power and energy sectors; and environmental and cultural resource compliance services. Additionally, it offers consulting services in sustainable building design, energy infrastructure upgrades, sustainable district heating network, and e-mobility; and planning, design, construction administration, commissioning, maintenance, decommissioning, and remediation services. The company was formerly known as Stanley Technology Group Inc. and changed its name to Stantec Inc. in October 1998. Stantec Inc. was founded in 1954 and is headquartered in Edmonton, Canada.

About Huron Consulting Group

Huron Consulting Group Inc., a professional services firm, provides consultancy services in the United States and internationally. It operates through three segments: Healthcare, Education, and Commercial. The Healthcare segment provides financial and operational performance improvement consulting services; digital offerings, spanning technology and analytic-related services; software products; organizational transformation services; revenue cycle managed and outsourcing services; financial and capital advisory consulting services; and strategy and innovation consulting services to national and regional health systems, academic and community health systems, federal health system, public, children’s and critical access hospitals, physician practices and medical groups, payors, and long-term care or post-acute providers. The Education segment provides digital solutions, spanning technology, and analytic-related services; Huron Research product suite, a software suite designed to facilitate and enhance research administration service delivery and compliance; research-focused consulting and managed services; strategy and operations consulting services for public and private colleges and universities, research institutes, and other education-related organizations. The Commercial segment delivers digital services and software products, and financial advisory services to financial, energy and utilities, professional and business services, life science, consumer products, and industrials and manufacturing industries, as well as public sector and nonprofit organizations. The company was incorporated in 2002 and is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois.