Head-To-Head Analysis: Synchrony Financial (NYSE:SYF) & Iris Energy (NASDAQ:IREN)

Synchrony Financial (NYSE:SYF) and Iris Energy (NASDAQ:IREN) are both finance companies, but which is the superior investment? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, dividends, analyst recommendations, profitability, risk, earnings and valuation.

Risk & Volatility

Synchrony Financial has a beta of 1.63, suggesting that its share price is 63% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Iris Energy has a beta of 3.54, suggesting that its share price is 254% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent ratings for Synchrony Financial and Iris Energy, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Synchrony Financial	1	6	14	1	2.68
Iris Energy	0	2	8	1	2.91

Synchrony Financial presently has a consensus target price of $61.53, suggesting a potential downside of 10.25%. Iris Energy has a consensus target price of $17.56, suggesting a potential upside of 30.72%. Given Iris Energy’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Iris Energy is more favorable than Synchrony Financial.

Profitability

This table compares Synchrony Financial and Iris Energy’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Synchrony Financial	13.98%	16.64%	1.96%
Iris Energy	-36.10%	-8.01%	-7.37%

Insider & Institutional Ownership

96.5% of Synchrony Financial shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 41.1% of Iris Energy shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.3% of Synchrony Financial shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 21.5% of Iris Energy shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Synchrony Financial and Iris Energy”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Synchrony Financial	$15.98 billion	1.67	$2.24 billion	$7.66	8.95
Iris Energy	$208.75 million	12.09	-$28.95 million	N/A	N/A

Synchrony Financial has higher revenue and earnings than Iris Energy.

Summary

Synchrony Financial beats Iris Energy on 7 of the 12 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Synchrony Financial

Synchrony Financial, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a consumer financial services company in the United States. It provides credit products, such as credit cards, commercial credit products, and consumer installment loans. The company also offers private label credit cards, dual co-brand and general purpose credit cards, short- and long-term installment loans, and consumer banking products; and deposit products, including certificates of deposit, individual retirement accounts, money market accounts, and savings accounts, and sweep and affinity deposits, as well as accepts deposits through third-party securities brokerage firms. In addition, it provides debt cancellation products to its credit card customers through online, mobile, and direct mail; and healthcare payments and financing solutions under the CareCredit and Walgreens brands; payments and financing solutions in the apparel, specialty retail, outdoor, music, and luxury industries, such as American Eagle, Dick's Sporting Goods, Guitar Center, Kawasaki, Pandora, Polaris, Suzuki, and Sweetwater. The company offers its credit products through programs established with a group of national and regional retailers, local merchants, manufacturers, buying groups, industry associations, and healthcare service providers; and deposit products through various channels, such as digital and print. It serves digital, health and wellness, retail, home, auto, telecommunications, jewelry, pets, and other industries. The company was founded in 1932 and is headquartered in Stamford, Connecticut.

About Iris Energy

Iris Energy Limited owns and operates bitcoin mining data centers. The company was incorporated in 2018 and is headquartered in Sydney, Australia.