Noah (NYSE:NOAH) and CI Financial (NYSE:CIXXF) Financial Review

CI Financial (NYSE:CIXXF) and Noah (NYSE:NOAH) are both finance companies, but which is the better investment? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their institutional ownership, valuation, analyst recommendations, profitability, earnings, dividends and risk.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of current ratings for CI Financial and Noah, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
CI Financial	0	1	0	0	2.00
Noah	0	1	1	0	2.50

Noah has a consensus price target of $15.50, suggesting a potential upside of 19.64%. Given Noah’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Noah is more favorable than CI Financial.

Dividends

CI Financial pays an annual dividend of $0.59 per share and has a dividend yield of 4.2%. Noah pays an annual dividend of $1.03 per share and has a dividend yield of 8.0%. CI Financial pays out -67.0% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Noah pays out 57.5% 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.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

42.7% of Noah shares are owned by institutional investors. 47.2% of Noah shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares CI Financial and Noah”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
CI Financial	$2.03 billion	1.04	$3.72 million	($0.88)	-15.88
Noah	$2.81 billion	0.30	$142.18 million	$1.79	7.24

Noah has higher revenue and earnings than CI Financial. CI Financial is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Noah, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Risk & Volatility

CI Financial has a beta of 1.35, suggesting that its share price is 35% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Noah has a beta of 0.76, suggesting that its share price is 24% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares CI Financial and Noah’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
CI Financial	-1.90%	50.83%	5.21%
Noah	26.81%	7.15%	5.81%

Summary

Noah beats CI Financial on 12 of the 16 factors compared between the two stocks.

About CI Financial

CI Financial Corp. is a publicly owned asset management holding company. Through its subsidiaries, the firm manages separate client focused equity, fixed income, and alternative investments portfolios. It also manages mutual funds, hedge funds, and fund of funds for its clients through its subsidiaries. The firm was founded in 1965 and is based in Toronto, Canada with additional offices in Vancouver, Canada; Calgary, Canada; and Montreal, Canada.

About Noah

Noah Holdings Limited, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a wealth and asset management service provider with the focus on investment and asset allocation services for high net worth individuals and enterprises in Mainland of China, Hong Kong, and internationally. It operates through three segments: Wealth Management, Asset Management, and Other Services. The company offers investment products, including domestic and overseas mutual fund products, private secondary products, and other products; customized value-added financial services, such as investor education and trust services, as well as insurance brokerage services; and insurance products. It also provides onshore and offshore private equity, real estate, public securities, multi-strategy, and other investment products, as well as lending services. The company was founded in 2005 and is headquartered in Shanghai, the People's Republic of China.