Financial Survey: FS Bancorp (NASDAQ:FSBW) & WaFd (NASDAQ:WAFD)

FS Bancorp (NASDAQ:FSBW) and WaFd (NASDAQ:WAFD) are both finance companies, but which is the superior business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, earnings, analyst recommendations, valuation, dividends, risk and profitability.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

63.9% of FS Bancorp shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 83.7% of WaFd shares are owned by institutional investors. 12.7% of FS Bancorp shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 1.5% of WaFd shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Risk and Volatility

FS Bancorp has a beta of 0.72, indicating that its share price is 28% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, WaFd has a beta of 0.86, indicating that its share price is 14% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares FS Bancorp and WaFd”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
FS Bancorp	$206.39 million	1.50	$35.02 million	$4.10	10.04
WaFd	$1.41 billion	1.74	$226.07 million	$2.64	12.13

WaFd has higher revenue and earnings than FS Bancorp. FS Bancorp is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than WaFd, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of recent ratings and recommmendations for FS Bancorp and WaFd, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
FS Bancorp	0	1	1	0	2.50
WaFd	0	5	0	0	2.00

FS Bancorp presently has a consensus target price of $41.00, indicating a potential downside of 0.41%. WaFd has a consensus target price of $32.00, indicating a potential downside of 0.09%. Given WaFd’s higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe WaFd is more favorable than FS Bancorp.

Dividends

FS Bancorp pays an annual dividend of $1.12 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.7%. WaFd pays an annual dividend of $1.08 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.4%. FS Bancorp pays out 27.3% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. WaFd pays out 40.9% 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. FS Bancorp has raised its dividend for 12 consecutive years and WaFd has raised its dividend for 2 consecutive years.

Profitability

This table compares FS Bancorp and WaFd’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
FS Bancorp	15.10%	10.84%	1.04%
WaFd	16.02%	8.40%	0.84%

Summary

WaFd beats FS Bancorp on 9 of the 17 factors compared between the two stocks.

About FS Bancorp

FS Bancorp, Inc. operates as a bank holding company for 1st Security Bank of Washington that provides banking and financial services to local families, local and regional businesses, and industry niches. The company operates in two segments, Commercial and Consumer Banking; and Home Lending. It offers various deposit instruments, including checking accounts, money market deposit accounts, savings accounts, and certificates of deposit. The company provides one-to-four-family residential first mortgages, second mortgage/home equity loan products, non-mortgage commercial business loans, commercial real estate loans, and construction and development loans, as well as consumer loans, which primarily include personal lines of credit, credit cards, automobile, direct home improvement, loans on deposit, and recreational loans. It operates full bank service branches and home loan production offices in suburban communities in the greater Puget Sound area, including Snohomish, King, Pierce, Jefferson, Kitsap, Clallam, Grays Harbor, and Thurston counties; and a loan production office in the market area of the Tri-Cities. FS Bancorp, Inc. was founded in 1936 and is headquartered in Mountlake Terrace, Washington.

About WaFd

WaFd, Inc operates as the bank holding company for Washington Federal Bank that provides lending, depository, insurance, and other banking services in the United States. The company offers deposit products, including business and personal checking accounts, and term certificates of deposit, as well as money market accounts and passbook savings accounts. It also provides single-family dwellings, construction, land acquisition and development, consumer lot, multi-family residential, commercial real estate, home equity, business, and consumer loans, as well as commercial and industrial loans. In addition, the company offers insurance brokerage services, such as individual and business insurance policies; holds and markets real estate properties; and debit and credit cards, as well as acts as the trustee. It serves consumers, mid-sized and large businesses, and owners and developers of commercial real estate. The company was formerly known as Washington Federal, Inc. and changed its name to WaFd, Inc in September 2023. WaFd, Inc was founded in 1917 and is headquartered in Seattle, Washington.