Head-To-Head Contrast: Fidelis Insurance (NYSE:FIHL) versus Assured Guaranty (NYSE:AGO)

Assured Guaranty (NYSE:AGO) and Fidelis Insurance (NYSE:FIHL) are both mid-cap finance companies, but which is the better investment? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, institutional ownership, earnings, dividends, profitability, valuation and risk.

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Assured Guaranty and Fidelis Insurance”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Assured Guaranty	$964.00 million	4.33	$376.00 million	$8.06	11.23
Fidelis Insurance	$2.42 billion	0.87	$113.30 million	($0.05)	-380.80

Assured Guaranty has higher earnings, but lower revenue than Fidelis Insurance. Fidelis Insurance is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Assured Guaranty, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Risk & Volatility

Assured Guaranty has a beta of 0.98, suggesting that its share price is 2% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Fidelis Insurance has a beta of 0.27, suggesting that its share price is 73% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

92.2% of Assured Guaranty shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 82.0% of Fidelis Insurance shares are held by institutional investors. 5.1% of Assured Guaranty shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Profitability

This table compares Assured Guaranty and Fidelis Insurance’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Assured Guaranty	44.53%	7.18%	3.38%
Fidelis Insurance	-0.56%	-0.94%	-0.18%

Dividends

Assured Guaranty pays an annual dividend of $1.36 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.5%. Fidelis Insurance pays an annual dividend of $0.60 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.2%. Assured Guaranty pays out 16.9% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Fidelis Insurance pays out -1,200.0% 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. Assured Guaranty has raised its dividend for 7 consecutive years. Fidelis Insurance is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of current ratings and price targets for Assured Guaranty and Fidelis Insurance, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Assured Guaranty	0	2	2	0	2.50
Fidelis Insurance	1	5	4	0	2.30

Assured Guaranty currently has a consensus price target of $101.00, indicating a potential upside of 11.55%. Fidelis Insurance has a consensus price target of $21.14, indicating a potential upside of 11.04%. Given Assured Guaranty’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Assured Guaranty is more favorable than Fidelis Insurance.

Summary

Assured Guaranty beats Fidelis Insurance on 13 of the 17 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Assured Guaranty

Assured Guaranty Ltd., together with its subsidiaries, provides credit protection products to public finance, infrastructure, and structured finance markets in the United States and internationally. It operates through two segments: Insurance and Asset Management. The company offers financial guaranty insurance that protects holders of debt instruments and other monetary obligations from defaults in scheduled payments. It insures and reinsures various debt obligations, including bonds issued by the United States state governmental authorities; and notes issued to finance infrastructure projects. In addition, the company insures and reinsures various the U.S. public finance obligations, such as general obligation, tax-backed, municipal utility, transportation, healthcare, higher education, infrastructure, housing revenue, investor-owned utility, renewable energy, and other public finance bonds. Further, the company involved in insuring and reinsuring of non-U.S. public finance obligations comprising regulated utilities, infrastructure finance, sovereign and sub-sovereign, renewable energy bonds, pooled infrastructure, and other public finance obligations; and the U.S. and non-U.S. Structured finance obligations, including residential mortgage-backed securities, life insurance transactions, consumer receivables securities, subscription finance facilities, pooled corporate obligations, and financial products. Additionally, it offers specialty business, such as real estate properties, insurance securitizations, and aircraft residual value insurance (RVI) transactions; and asset management services comprising investment advisory services. It markets its financial guaranty insurance directly to issuers and underwriters of public finance and structured finance securities, as well as to investors in such obligations. Assured Guaranty Ltd. was incorporated in 2003 and is headquartered in Hamilton, Bermuda.

About Fidelis Insurance

Fidelis Insurance Holdings Limited, a specialty insurer, provides insurance and reinsurance solutions in Bermuda, the Republic of Ireland, and the United Kingdom. It operates in three segments: Specialty, Reinsurance, and Bespoke segments. The Specialty segment offers aviation and aerospace, energy, marine, property direct and facultative, and other specialty risk solutions. The Reinsurance segment provides property, retrocession, and whole account reinsurance solutions. The Bespoke segment offers customized risk solutions for clients that include credit and political risk, as well as other risk transfer opportunities, including political violence and terrorism, limited cyber reinsurance, tax liabilities, title, transactional liabilities, and other bespoke solutions. Fidelis Insurance Holdings Limited was incorporated in 2014 and is headquartered in Pembroke, Bermuda.