Head-To-Head Analysis: Oak Valley Bancorp (NASDAQ:OVLY) & Origin Bancorp (NASDAQ:OBK)

Oak Valley Bancorp (NASDAQ:OVLY) and Origin Bancorp (NASDAQ:OBK) are both small-cap finance companies, but which is the better business? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their profitability, earnings, risk, valuation, institutional ownership, dividends and analyst recommendations.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent recommendations and price targets for Oak Valley Bancorp and Origin Bancorp, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Oak Valley Bancorp	0	0	0	0	0.00
Origin Bancorp	0	1	3	1	3.00

Origin Bancorp has a consensus target price of $36.80, indicating a potential upside of 10.54%. Given Origin Bancorp’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe Origin Bancorp is more favorable than Oak Valley Bancorp.

Dividends

Oak Valley Bancorp pays an annual dividend of $0.45 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.5%. Origin Bancorp pays an annual dividend of $0.60 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.8%. Oak Valley Bancorp pays out 15.0% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Origin Bancorp pays out 24.7% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Both companies have healthy payout ratios and should be able to cover their dividend payments with earnings for the next several years.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares Oak Valley Bancorp and Origin Bancorp”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Oak Valley Bancorp	$76.98 million	3.18	$30.85 million	$3.00	9.75
Origin Bancorp	$354.68 million	2.93	$83.80 million	$2.43	13.70

Origin Bancorp has higher revenue and earnings than Oak Valley Bancorp. Oak Valley Bancorp is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Origin Bancorp, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Profitability

This table compares Oak Valley Bancorp and Origin Bancorp’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Oak Valley Bancorp	28.03%	14.38%	1.34%
Origin Bancorp	12.12%	7.36%	0.82%

Volatility and Risk

Oak Valley Bancorp has a beta of 0.34, indicating that its share price is 66% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Origin Bancorp has a beta of 1, indicating that its share price has a similar volatility profile to the S&P 500.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

30.9% of Oak Valley Bancorp shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 54.7% of Origin Bancorp shares are owned by institutional investors. 19.3% of Oak Valley Bancorp shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 6.2% of Origin Bancorp shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Summary

Origin Bancorp beats Oak Valley Bancorp on 10 of the 17 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Oak Valley Bancorp

Oak Valley Bancorp operates as the bank holding company for Oak Valley Community Bank that provides a range of commercial banking services to individuals and small to medium-sized businesses in the Central Valley and the Eastern Sierras. The company's deposits products include checking and savings, money market, health savings, and individual retirement accounts, as well as certificates of deposit. It also offers commercial real estate loans, commercial business lending and trade finance, and small business administration lending, as well as consumer loans, including automobile loans, home mortgages, credit lines, and other personal loans. In addition, the company provides online and mobile banking, remote deposit capture, merchant, night depository, extended hours, wire transfer of funds, note collection services, and automated teller machines. The company was incorporated in 1990 and is headquartered in Oakdale, California.

About Origin Bancorp

Origin Bancorp, Inc. operates as a bank holding company for Origin Bank that provides banking and financial services to small and medium-sized businesses, municipalities, and retail clients in Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi. It offers noninterest and interest-bearing checking accounts, savings deposits, money market accounts, and time deposits; and offers commercial real estate, construction and land development, consumer, residential real estate, commercial and industrial, mortgage warehouse, and residential mortgage loans. The company also offers personal and commercial property, and casualty insurance products; and Internet banking and voice response information, mobile applications, cash management, overdraft protection, direct deposit, safe deposit boxes, U.S. savings bonds, and automatic account transfer services; and mobile and online banking, treasury management, mortgage origination and servicing facilities, peer-to-peer electronic pay solutions, and personal financial management solutions. The company was founded in 1912 and is headquartered in Ruston, Louisiana.