Reviewing SURO Capital (NASDAQ:SSSS) and John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund (NYSE:PDT)

SURO Capital (NASDAQ:SSSS) and John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund (NYSE:PDT) are both small-cap finance companies, but which is the better business? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their dividends, earnings, profitability, valuation, analyst recommendations, institutional ownership and risk.

Dividends

SURO Capital pays an annual dividend of $1.00 per share and has a dividend yield of 11.5%. John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund pays an annual dividend of $0.99 per share and has a dividend yield of 7.4%. SURO Capital pays out -52.9% of its earnings in the form of a dividend.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent ratings and recommmendations for SURO Capital and John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
SURO Capital	0	0	4	0	3.00
John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund	0	0	0	0	0.00

SURO Capital currently has a consensus target price of $10.00, suggesting a potential upside of 14.55%. Given SURO Capital’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities research analysts plainly believe SURO Capital is more favorable than John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares SURO Capital and John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
SURO Capital	$68.40 million	3.05	-$38.12 million	($1.89)	-4.62
John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A

John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund has lower revenue, but higher earnings than SURO Capital.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

12.9% of SURO Capital shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 13.0% of John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund shares are owned by institutional investors. 6.7% of SURO Capital shares are owned 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 SURO Capital and John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
SURO Capital	2,015.55%	-6.10%	-4.25%
John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund	N/A	N/A	N/A

Risk and Volatility

SURO Capital has a beta of 1.8, suggesting that its share price is 80% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund has a beta of 0.8, suggesting that its share price is 20% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

SURO Capital beats John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund on 9 of the 12 factors compared between the two stocks.

About SURO Capital

SuRo Capital Corp. is a business development company. The firm seeks to invest in growth capital, late stage and venture capital-backed private companies. SuRo Capital Corp. was founded in 2010 and is based in San Francisco, California with additional office in New York, New York.

About John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund

John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund is a closed ended equity mutual fund launched and managed by John Hancock Investment Management LLC. It is co-managed by John Hancock Asset Management. The fund invests in the public equity markets of the United States. It seeks to invest in stocks of companies operating across diversified sectors, with an emphasis on the utilities sector. The fund primarily invests in dividend paying preferred stocks and common stocks of companies. It benchmarks the performance of its portfolio against a composite benchmark comprised of 70% Bank of America Merrill Lynch Preferred Stock DRD Eligible Index and 30% S&P 500 Utilities Index. The fund was formerly known as John Hancock Patriot Premium Dividend Fund II. John Hancock Premium Dividend Fund was formed on December 21, 1989 and is domiciled in the United States.