Comparing IBEX (NASDAQ:IBEX) and Applied Digital (NASDAQ:APLD)

Applied Digital (NASDAQ:APLD) and IBEX (NASDAQ:IBEX) are both small-cap finance companies, but which is the superior business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their earnings, valuation, profitability, analyst recommendations, dividends, institutional ownership and risk.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current recommendations and price targets for Applied Digital and IBEX, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Applied Digital	0	0	6	0	3.00
IBEX	0	2	2	0	2.50

Applied Digital presently has a consensus price target of $10.50, suggesting a potential upside of 21.95%. IBEX has a consensus price target of $20.50, suggesting a potential upside of 12.70%. Given Applied Digital’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, equities analysts plainly believe Applied Digital is more favorable than IBEX.

Volatility and Risk

Applied Digital has a beta of 4.56, suggesting that its stock price is 356% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, IBEX has a beta of 0.74, suggesting that its stock price is 26% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Applied Digital and IBEX”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Applied Digital	$189.96 million	6.22	-$149.27 million	($0.79)	-10.90
IBEX	$508.57 million	0.62	$33.65 million	$1.53	11.89

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

Profitability

This table compares Applied Digital and IBEX’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Applied Digital	-74.95%	-107.05%	-22.64%
IBEX	6.62%	22.04%	11.93%

Institutional and Insider Ownership

65.7% of Applied Digital shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 81.2% of IBEX shares are owned by institutional investors. 20.5% of Applied Digital shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 20.8% of IBEX shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Summary

IBEX beats Applied Digital on 9 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Applied Digital

Applied Digital Corporation designs, develops, and operates datacenters in North America. Its datacenters provide digital infrastructure solutions to the high-performance computing industry. The company also provides artificial intelligence cloud services, high performance computing datacenter hosting, and crypto datacenter hosting services. The company was formerly known as Applied Blockchain, Inc. and changed its name to Applied Digital Corporation in November 2022. Applied Digital Corporation is based in Dallas, Texas.

About IBEX

IBEX Limited provides end-to-end technology-enabled customer lifecycle experience solutions in the United States and internationally. The company products and services portfolio includes ibex Connect, that offers customer service, technical support, revenue generation, and other revenue generation outsourced back-office services through the CX model, which integrates voice, email, chat, SMS, social media, and other communication applications; ibex Digital, a customer acquisition solution that comprises digital marketing, e-commerce technology, and platform solutions; and ibex CX, a customer experience solution, which provides a suite of proprietary software tools to measure, monitor, and manage its clients' customer experience. It operates customer engagement and customer acquisition delivery centers. The company serves banking and financial services, delivery and logistics, health tech and wellness, high tech, retail and e-commerce, streaming and entertainment, travel and hospitality, and utility industries. The company was formerly known as IBEX Holdings Limited and changed its name to IBEX Limited in September 2019. IBEX Limited was incorporated in 2017 and is headquartered in Washington, District of Columbia. The company is a subsidiary of The Resource Group International Limited.