Financial Comparison: PENG (NASDAQ:PENG) vs. Viavi Solutions (NASDAQ:VIAV)

PENG (NASDAQ:PENG) and Viavi Solutions (NASDAQ:VIAV) are both computer and technology companies, but which is the superior stock? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, dividends, profitability, earnings, valuation and risk.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares PENG and Viavi Solutions”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
PENG	$1.17 billion	0.78	-$52.47 million	($1.00)	-17.12
Viavi Solutions	$990.70 million	2.29	-$25.80 million	($0.17)	-60.18

Viavi Solutions has lower revenue, but higher earnings than PENG. Viavi Solutions is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than PENG, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Volatility and Risk

PENG has a beta of 1.7, indicating that its stock price is 70% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Viavi Solutions has a beta of 0.9, indicating that its stock price is 10% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent recommendations for PENG and Viavi Solutions, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
PENG	0	0	4	0	3.00
Viavi Solutions	0	5	2	1	2.50

PENG currently has a consensus price target of $23.75, suggesting a potential upside of 38.73%. Viavi Solutions has a consensus price target of $10.42, suggesting a potential upside of 1.82%. Given PENG’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe PENG is more favorable than Viavi Solutions.

Profitability

This table compares PENG and Viavi Solutions’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
PENG	-4.48%	8.05%	2.14%
Viavi Solutions	-3.78%	2.22%	0.88%

Insider & Institutional Ownership

95.5% of Viavi Solutions shares are held by institutional investors. 2.4% of PENG shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 1.5% of Viavi Solutions shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Summary

PENG beats Viavi Solutions on 9 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About PENG

SMART Global Holdings, Inc., a memory-focused company, engages in the designing and development of enterprise solutions in the United States, China, Europe, and internationally. It operates through Memory Solutions, Intelligent Platform Solutions, and LED Solutions segments. The company offers dynamic random access memory modules, solid-state and flash storage, and other advanced memory solutions for networking and telecom, data analytics, artificial intelligence and machine learning applications; and supply chain services including procurement, logistics, inventory management, temporary warehousing, programming, kitting, and packaging services. It also provides Penguin Computing that focus on technical computing for core and cloud environments through HPC and AI solutions; and Penguin Edge, an edge computing solution for embedded and wireless applications including high-performance products for government, health care, industrial, and telecommunications applications. In addition, the company offers Stratus, which provides simplified, protected, and autonomous fault tolerant computing solutions in the data center and at the Edge through hardware and software services; and leading-edge solutions to education, energy, financial services, government, hyperscale, and manufacturing markets. Further, it provides LED-based products comprising blue and green LED chips based on gallium nitride, and related materials under Cree LED brand; and surface mount devices under the Cree LED XLamp and J Series brand. The company sells its products directly to original equipment manufacturers, enterprise, government and other end customers through direct sales force, e-commerce, customer service representatives, on-site field application engineers, independent sales representatives, distributors, integrators, and resellers. SMART Global Holdings, Inc. was founded in 1988 and is headquartered in Milpitas, California.

About Viavi Solutions

Viavi Solutions Inc. provides network test, monitoring, and assurance solutions for communications service providers, hyperscalers, network equipment manufacturers, original equipment manufacturers, government, and avionics customers in the Americas, the Asia-Pacific, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. The company operates through three segments: Network Enablement (NE), Service Enablement (SE), and Optical Security and Performance Products (OSP). The NE segment offers testing solutions that access the network to perform build-out and maintenance tasks. Its solutions include instruments, software, and services to design, build, activate, certify, troubleshoot, and optimize networks; and test and measurement instrumentation for communication and safety. It also offers support and professional services, such as repair, calibration, software support, and technical assistance for the products; and system integration projects, including project management, installation, and implementation, as well as product and technology training, and consulting services. The SE segment provides embedded systems and enterprise performance management solutions for communication service providers, enterprises, and cloud operators with visibility into network, service, and application data. Its solutions include instruments, microprobes, and software, which monitor, collect, and analyze network data to reveal the actual customer experience and to identify opportunities for new revenue streams and network optimization. The OSP segment offers optical products for anti-counterfeiting, consumer and industrial, government, automotive, and industrial markets. The company was formerly known as JDS Uniphase Corporation. Viavi Solutions Inc. was founded in 1923 and is headquartered in Chandler, Arizona.