Critical Comparison: Cosan (NYSE:CSAN) versus Greenfire Resources (NYSE:GFR)

Cosan (NYSE:CSAN) and Greenfire Resources (NYSE:GFR) are both energy companies, but which is the superior business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their earnings, profitability, institutional ownership, valuation, dividends, analyst recommendations and risk.

Profitability

This table compares Cosan and Greenfire Resources’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Cosan	-28.08%	-27.61%	-8.25%
Greenfire Resources	28.61%	24.62%	16.27%

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of recent ratings for Cosan and Greenfire Resources, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Cosan	1	2	1	1	2.40
Greenfire Resources	0	1	0	0	2.00

Cosan currently has a consensus target price of $9.47, indicating a potential upside of 106.92%. Given Cosan’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe Cosan is more favorable than Greenfire Resources.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Cosan and Greenfire Resources”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Cosan	$8.15 billion	0.26	-$1.75 billion	$1.32	3.47
Greenfire Resources	$600.67 million	0.54	$88.61 million	$2.04	2.30

Greenfire Resources has lower revenue, but higher earnings than Cosan. Greenfire Resources is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Cosan, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Risk & Volatility

Cosan has a beta of 1.01, suggesting that its share price is 1% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Greenfire Resources has a beta of 0.27, suggesting that its share price is 73% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

88.9% of Greenfire Resources shares are owned by institutional investors. 20.0% of Greenfire Resources shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Summary

Greenfire Resources beats Cosan on 8 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Cosan

Cosan S.A. engages in the fuel distribution business. It operates through Raízen, Compass, Moove, Rumo, and Radar segments. The company’s Raízen segment engages in the production, commercialization, origination, and trading of ethanol, bioenergy, renewable sources, and sugar; trading and resale of electricity; and distribution and commercialization of fuels and lubricants. Its Compass segment distributes piped natural gas to industrial, residential, commercial, automotive, and cogeneration customers; and develops infrastructure projects in a regasification terminal, offshore gas pipeline, and thermal generation projects utilizing natural gas, as well as commercialization of electricity and natural gas. The company’s Moove segment produces and distributes lubricants under the Comma brand. Its Rumo segment provides logistics services for rail transportation, port storage, and loading of goods, including grains and sugar; and leases locomotives, wagons, and another railroad equipment, as well as operates containers. The company’s Radar segment manages agricultural property. It operates in Brazil, England, France, Spain and Portugal, Argentina, Bolivia, Uruguay and Paraguay, the United States, Asia, and internationally. Cosan S.A. was founded in 1936 and is headquartered in São Paulo, Brazil.

About Greenfire Resources

Greenfire Resources Ltd., together with its subsidiaries, engages in the development, exploration, and operation of oil and gas properties in the Athabasca oil sands region of Alberta. The company operates the Tier-1 oil sands assets located in Western Canada. It utilizes steam-assisted gravity drainage (SAGD) extraction technology, a situ thermal oil recovery process to recover diluted and non- diluted bitumen. The company is headquartered in Calgary, Canada.