HealthStream (NASDAQ:HSTM) and Sound Group (NASDAQ:SOGP) Head to Head Contrast

Sound Group (NASDAQ:SOGP) and HealthStream (NASDAQ:HSTM) are both small-cap consumer discretionary companies, but which is the better investment? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their institutional ownership, valuation, earnings, profitability, risk, analyst recommendations and dividends.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of current ratings for Sound Group and HealthStream, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Sound Group	0	0	0	0	N/A
HealthStream	0	1	2	0	2.67

HealthStream has a consensus target price of $32.00, suggesting a potential upside of 14.33%. Given HealthStream’s higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe HealthStream is more favorable than Sound Group.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

1.6% of Sound Group shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 69.6% of HealthStream shares are held by institutional investors. 25.2% of Sound Group shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 20.6% of HealthStream shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Risk & Volatility

Sound Group has a beta of 1.69, suggesting that its stock price is 69% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, HealthStream has a beta of 0.38, suggesting that its stock price is 62% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Sound Group and HealthStream’s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Sound Group	$316.83 million	0.03	$12.54 million	$0.99	2.12
HealthStream	$282.88 million	3.01	$15.21 million	$0.58	48.26

HealthStream has lower revenue, but higher earnings than Sound Group. Sound Group is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than HealthStream, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Profitability

This table compares Sound Group and HealthStream’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Sound Group	1.69%	8.71%	4.96%
HealthStream	6.30%	5.21%	3.56%

Summary

HealthStream beats Sound Group on 7 of the 13 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Sound Group

Sound Group Inc. operates as an audio-centric social and entertainment company. It focuses on building audio platform to connect and communicate. The company, through its product portfolio and in-house technologies, caters to user interest in audio entertainment and social networking. The company was formerly known as LIZHI INC. and changed its name to Sound Group Inc. in January 2024. Sound Group Inc. was founded in 2010 and is based in Singapore.

About HealthStream

HealthStream, Inc. provides Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) based applications for healthcare organizations in the United States. The company's solutions help healthcare organizations in meeting their ongoing clinical development, talent management, training, education, assessment, competency management, safety and compliance, and scheduling, as well as provider credentialing, privileging, and enrollment needs. It offers hStream, a technology platform that powers a range of healthcare workforce solutions. The company provides its solutions to customers across a range of entities within the healthcare industry, including private, not-for-profit, and government entities, as well as pharmaceutical and medical device companies through its direct sales teams. The company was incorporated in 1990 and is headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee.