Park Aerospace (NYSE:PKE) and Rocket Lab (NASDAQ:RKLB) Head-To-Head Survey

Park Aerospace (NYSE:PKE) and Rocket Lab (NASDAQ:RKLB) are both aerospace companies, but which is the better stock? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their profitability, valuation, analyst recommendations, earnings, institutional ownership, risk and dividends.

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of current ratings and target prices for Park Aerospace and Rocket Lab, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Park Aerospace	0	1	0	0	2.00
Rocket Lab	1	5	7	2	2.67

Rocket Lab has a consensus price target of $61.25, indicating a potential downside of 28.80%. Given Rocket Lab’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe Rocket Lab is more favorable than Park Aerospace.

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Park Aerospace and Rocket Lab”s gross revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Park Aerospace	$62.03 million	7.11	$5.88 million	$0.36	61.50
Rocket Lab	$436.21 million	105.35	-$190.18 million	($0.38)	-226.39

Park Aerospace has higher earnings, but lower revenue than Rocket Lab. Rocket Lab is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Park Aerospace, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Risk and Volatility

Park Aerospace has a beta of 0.31, meaning that its share price is 69% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Rocket Lab has a beta of 2.16, meaning that its share price is 116% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

77.8% of Park Aerospace shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 71.8% of Rocket Lab shares are held by institutional investors. 11.3% of Park Aerospace shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 11.9% of Rocket Lab shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Profitability

This table compares Park Aerospace and Rocket Lab’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Park Aerospace	11.57%	7.97%	7.01%
Rocket Lab	-35.64%	-27.26%	-12.21%

Summary

Rocket Lab beats Park Aerospace on 8 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Park Aerospace

Park Aerospace Corp., an aerospace company, develops and manufactures solution and hot-melt advanced composite materials used to produce composite structures for the aerospace market in North America, Asia, and Europe. It offers advanced composite materials, including film adhesives and lightning strike protection materials that are used to produce primary and secondary structures for jet engines, large and regional transport aircrafts, military aircrafts, unmanned aerial vehicles, business jets, general aviation aircrafts, and rotary wing aircrafts. The company also provides specialty ablative materials for rocket motors and nozzles; and specially designed materials for radome applications. In addition, it designs and fabricates composite parts, structures and assemblies, and low volume tooling for the aerospace industry. The company was formerly known as Park Electrochemical Corp. and changed its name to Park Aerospace Corp. in July 2019. Park Aerospace Corp. was incorporated in 1954 and is based in Westbury, New York.

About Rocket Lab

Rocket Lab USA, Inc., a space company, provides launch services and space systems solutions for the space and defense industries. The company provides launch services, spacecraft design services, spacecraft components, spacecraft manufacturing, and other spacecraft and on-orbit management solutions; and constellation management services, as well as designs and manufactures small and medium-class rockets. It also designs, manufactures, and sells Electron, a reusable orbital-class small rocket; and the Photon satellite platforms, as well as developing the Neutron 8-ton payload class launch vehicle; conducts remote launch activities; and designs and manufactures a range of components and subsystems for the Photon family of spacecraft and broader merchant spacecraft components. The company serves commercial, aerospace prime contractors, and government customers. Rocket Lab USA, Inc. was founded in 2006 and is headquartered in Long Beach, California.