Head to Head Survey: Crawford & Company (NYSE:CRD.A) versus BrightView (NYSE:BV)

BrightView (NYSE:BV) and Crawford & Company (NYSE:CRD.A) are both small-cap business services companies, but which is the superior investment? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their risk, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, earnings, profitability, dividends and valuation.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current ratings and recommmendations for BrightView and Crawford & Company, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
BrightView	3	2	3	1	2.22
Crawford & Company	0	0	1	0	3.00

BrightView currently has a consensus price target of $14.52, suggesting a potential upside of 2.12%. Crawford & Company has a consensus price target of $14.00, suggesting a potential upside of 25.83%. Given Crawford & Company’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Crawford & Company is more favorable than BrightView.

Profitability

This table compares BrightView and Crawford & Company’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
BrightView	1.70%	7.25%	2.73%
Crawford & Company	1.37%	24.21%	5.46%

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares BrightView and Crawford & Company”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
BrightView	$2.67 billion	0.50	$56.00 million	($0.07)	-203.07
Crawford & Company	$1.31 billion	0.41	$19.63 million	$0.36	30.91

BrightView has higher revenue and earnings than Crawford & Company. BrightView is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Crawford & Company, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

92.4% of BrightView shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 22.6% of Crawford & Company shares are held by institutional investors. 2.8% of BrightView shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 54.3% of Crawford & Company shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Volatility & Risk

BrightView has a beta of 1.17, suggesting that its share price is 17% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Crawford & Company has a beta of 0.8, suggesting that its share price is 20% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

BrightView beats Crawford & Company on 8 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About BrightView

BrightView Holdings, Inc., through its subsidiaries, provides commercial landscaping services in the United States. It operates through two segments, Maintenance Services and Development Services. The Maintenance Services segment delivers a suite of recurring commercial landscaping services, including mowing, gardening, mulching and snow removal, water management, irrigation maintenance, tree care, golf course maintenance, and specialty turf maintenance. Its customers' properties include corporate and commercial properties, homeowners associations, public parks, hotels and resorts, airport authorities, municipalities, hospitals and other healthcare facilities, educational institutions, restaurants and retail, and golf courses. This segment's customer base includes approximately 8,800 office parks and corporate campuses 7,100 residential communities, and 550 educational institutions. The Development Services segment offers landscape architecture and development services for new facilities and redesign projects. Its services include project design and management services, landscape architecture and installation, irrigation installation, tree moving and installation, pool and water features, sports field, and other services. BrightView Holdings, Inc. also operates as official field consultant to various league baseball. The company was founded in 1939 and is headquartered in Blue Bell, Pennsylvania.

About Crawford & Company

Crawford & Company provides claims management and outsourcing solutions to the risk management and insurance industry, and self-insured entities. The company's Crawford Claims Solutions segment offers claims management services related to property, casualty, and catastrophe losses caused by physical damage to commercial and residential real properties, and personal properties, as well as marine losses. It also offers services in the areas of field investigation, catastrophe, evaluation, and resolution of property and casualty insurance claims; and various on-demand inspection, verification, and other task specific field services for businesses and consumers through a mobile platform. Its Crawford TPA Solutions segment provides claims and risk management services; desktop claim adjusting and claims evaluation services; initial loss reporting services for claimants; loss mitigation services, such as medical bill review and case management, and vocational rehabilitation services; and risk management information services, as well as administers trust funds established to pay claims. It offers services for workers' compensation, auto and liability, disability absence and medical management, and accident and health markets. The company's Crawford Specialty Solutions segment offers claims management services related to large and complex losses in various industries, such as commercial property, aviation, forensic accounting, marine and transportation, retail, building and construction, cyber, and energy. It also provides a customer-centric solution for various loss types comprising high-frequency and low-complexity claims, and large complex repairs; and outsourced contractor management services to personal and commercial insurance carriers, and consumer markets. The company operates in the United States, the United Kingdom and the rest of Europe, Canada, Australia, and internationally. Crawford & Company was founded in 1941 and is based in Peachtree Corners, Georgia.