Reviewing United Development Funding IV (OTCMKTS:UDFI) & Retail Opportunity Investments (NASDAQ:ROIC)

Retail Opportunity Investments (NASDAQ:ROIC) and United Development Funding IV (OTCMKTS:UDFI) are both finance companies, but which is the better business? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their profitability, dividends, analyst recommendations, institutional ownership, valuation, risk and earnings.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

97.2% of Retail Opportunity Investments shares are owned by institutional investors. 3.0% of Retail Opportunity Investments shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.5% of United Development Funding IV shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent recommendations for Retail Opportunity Investments and United Development Funding IV, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Retail Opportunity Investments	1	1	2	0	2.25
United Development Funding IV	0	0	0	0	N/A

Retail Opportunity Investments currently has a consensus target price of $14.38, suggesting a potential upside of 17.44%. Given Retail Opportunity Investments’ higher possible upside, equities research analysts plainly believe Retail Opportunity Investments is more favorable than United Development Funding IV.

Profitability

This table compares Retail Opportunity Investments and United Development Funding IV’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Retail Opportunity Investments	11.21%	2.75%	1.24%
United Development Funding IV	N/A	N/A	N/A

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares Retail Opportunity Investments and United Development Funding IV’s revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Retail Opportunity Investments	$327.73 million	4.76	$34.53 million	$0.30	40.80
United Development Funding IV	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A

Retail Opportunity Investments has higher revenue and earnings than United Development Funding IV.

Summary

Retail Opportunity Investments beats United Development Funding IV on 8 of the 8 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Retail Opportunity Investments

Retail Opportunity Investments Corp. (Nasdaq: ROIC), is a fully integrated, self-managed real estate investment trust (REIT) that specializes in the acquisition, ownership and management of grocery-anchored shopping centers located in densely populated, metropolitan markets across the West Coast. As of December 31, 2023, ROIC owned 94 shopping centers encompassing approximately 10.6 million square feet. ROIC is the largest publicly-traded, grocery-anchored shopping center REIT focused exclusively on the West Coast. ROIC is a member of the S&P SmallCap 600 Index and has investment-grade corporate debt ratings from Moody's Investor Services, S&P Global Ratings and Fitch Ratings, Inc.

About United Development Funding IV

United Development Funding IV invests in secured loans for the acquisition and development of land into single-family home lots, and the construction of model and new single-family homes. It also makes equity investments in residential real estate. The company has elected to be taxed as a real estate investment trust. As a result, it would not be subject to corporate income tax on that portion of its net income that is distributed to shareholders. United Development Funding IV was founded in 2008 and is headquartered in Grapevine, Texas.