Critical Review: WEBTOON Entertainment (NASDAQ:WBTN) & Thomson Reuters (NYSE:TRI)

Thomson Reuters (NYSE:TRI) and WEBTOON Entertainment (NASDAQ:WBTN) are both business services companies, but which is the better investment? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, dividends, profitability, risk, earnings and valuation.

Profitability

This table compares Thomson Reuters and WEBTOON Entertainment’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Thomson Reuters	33.65%	15.22%	9.09%
WEBTOON Entertainment	N/A	N/A	N/A

Institutional & Insider Ownership

17.3% of Thomson Reuters shares are owned by institutional investors. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Thomson Reuters and WEBTOON Entertainment”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Thomson Reuters	$7.03 billion	10.53	$2.70 billion	$5.25	31.39
WEBTOON Entertainment	$1.30 billion	1.09	N/A	N/A	N/A

Thomson Reuters has higher revenue and earnings than WEBTOON Entertainment.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of recent ratings and price targets for Thomson Reuters and WEBTOON Entertainment, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Thomson Reuters	0	7	5	0	2.42
WEBTOON Entertainment	0	2	4	0	2.67

Thomson Reuters currently has a consensus target price of $173.73, indicating a potential upside of 5.43%. WEBTOON Entertainment has a consensus target price of $27.17, indicating a potential upside of 142.99%. Given WEBTOON Entertainment’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe WEBTOON Entertainment is more favorable than Thomson Reuters.

Summary

Thomson Reuters beats WEBTOON Entertainment on 7 of the 9 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Thomson Reuters

Thomson Reuters Corporation engages in the provision of business information services in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Asia Pacific. It operates in five segments: Legal Professionals, Corporates, Tax & Accounting Professionals, Reuters News, and Global Print. The Legal Professionals segment offers research and workflow products focusing on legal research and integrated legal workflow solutions that combine content, tools, and analytics to law firms and governments. The Corporates segment provides a suite of content-driven technologies, including generative AI, integrated workflow solutions to small businesses to multinational organizations. The Tax & Accounting Professionals segment offers research and workflow products focusing on tax offerings and automating tax workflows to tax, accounting, and audit professionals in accounting firms. The Reuters News segment provides business, financial, and international news to media organizations, professional, and news consumers through Reuters News Agency, Reuters.com, Reuters Events, Thomson Reuters products, and to financial market professionals. The Global Print segment offers legal and tax information primarily in print format. The company was formerly known as The Thomson Corporation and changed its name to Thomson Reuters Corporation in April 2008. The company was founded in 1851 and is based in Toronto, Canada. Thomson Reuters Corporation operates as a subsidiary of The Woodbridge Company Limited.

About WEBTOON Entertainment

WEBTOON Entertainment Inc. operates a storytelling platform worldwide. The company’s platform allows a community of creators and users to discover, create, and share new content. Its platform offers stories primarily in two ways, including web-comics, a graphical comic-like medium; and web-novels, which are text-based stories. The company was founded in 2014 and is headquartered in Los Angeles, California. WEBTOON Entertainment Inc. is a subsidiary of NAVER Corporation.