U-Haul (NASDAQ:UHALB) & ZTO Express (Cayman) (NYSE:ZTO) Head-To-Head Survey

U-Haul (NASDAQ:UHALB) and ZTO Express (Cayman) (NYSE:ZTO) are both large-cap transportation companies, but which is the better stock? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their dividends, profitability, earnings, valuation, analyst recommendations, risk and institutional ownership.

Dividends

U-Haul pays an annual dividend of $0.20 per share and has a dividend yield of 0.4%. ZTO Express (Cayman) pays an annual dividend of $0.58 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.1%. U-Haul pays out 14.0% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. ZTO Express (Cayman) pays out 39.2% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Both companies have healthy payout ratios and should be able to cover their dividend payments with earnings for the next several years.

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of current recommendations and price targets for U-Haul and ZTO Express (Cayman), as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
U-Haul	0	0	0	0	0.00
ZTO Express (Cayman)	0	3	3	1	2.71

ZTO Express (Cayman) has a consensus target price of $22.36, suggesting a potential upside of 20.22%. Given ZTO Express (Cayman)’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe ZTO Express (Cayman) is more favorable than U-Haul.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

35.7% of U-Haul shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 41.7% of ZTO Express (Cayman) shares are held by institutional investors. 41.3% of ZTO Express (Cayman) shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares U-Haul and ZTO Express (Cayman)”s gross revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
U-Haul	$5.90 billion	1.68	$367.09 million	$1.43	35.29
ZTO Express (Cayman)	$6.07 billion	1.83	$1.21 billion	$1.48	12.57

ZTO Express (Cayman) has higher revenue and earnings than U-Haul. ZTO Express (Cayman) is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than U-Haul, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Profitability

This table compares U-Haul and ZTO Express (Cayman)’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
U-Haul	5.31%	4.06%	1.52%
ZTO Express (Cayman)	18.83%	14.44%	9.72%

Summary

ZTO Express (Cayman) beats U-Haul on 14 of the 16 factors compared between the two stocks.

About U-Haul

AMERCO operates as a do-it-yourself moving and storage operator for household and commercial goods in the United States and Canada. The company's Moving and Storage segment rents trucks, trailers, portable moving and storage units, specialty rental items, and self-storage spaces primarily to the household movers; and sells moving supplies, towing accessories, and propane. It also provides uhaul.com, an online marketplace that connects consumers to independent Moving Help service providers and independent self-storage affiliates; auto transport and tow dolly options to transport vehicles; and specialty boxes for dishes, computers, flat screen television, and sensitive electronic equipment, as well as tapes, security locks, and packing supplies. This segment rents its products and services through a network of approximately 2,100 company operated retail moving stores and 21,100 independent U-Haul dealers. As of March 31, 2022, it had a rental fleet of approximately 186,000 trucks, 128,000 trailers, and 46,000 towing devices; and 1,844 self-storage locations with approximately 876,000 rentable storage units. The company's Property and Casualty Insurance segment offers loss adjusting and claims handling services. It also provides moving and storage protection packages, such as Safemove and Safetow packages, which offer moving and towing customers with a damage waiver, cargo protection, and medical and life insurance coverage; Safestor that protects storage customers from loss on their goods in storage; Safestor Mobile, which protects customers stored belongings; and Safemove Plus, which provides rental customers with a layer of primary liability protection. The company's Life Insurance segment provides life and health insurance products primarily to the senior market through the direct writing and reinsuring of life insurance, medicare supplement, and annuity policies. AMERCO was founded in 1945 and is based in Reno, Nevada.

About ZTO Express (Cayman)

ZTO Express (Cayman) Inc. provides express delivery and other value-added logistics services in the People's Republic of China. It offers freight forwarding services; and delivery services for e-commerce and traditional merchants, and other express service users. The company was founded in 2002 and is headquartered in Shanghai, the People's Republic of China.