Contrasting Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust (NASDAQ:WHLR) & Orchid Island Capital (NYSE:ORC)

Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust (NASDAQ:WHLR) and Orchid Island Capital (NYSE:ORC) are both small-cap finance companies, but which is the superior stock? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, earnings, profitability, risk, analyst recommendations, valuation and dividends.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent ratings and price targets for Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust and Orchid Island Capital, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust	0	0	0	0	0.00
Orchid Island Capital	0	1	1	0	2.50

Orchid Island Capital has a consensus price target of $9.50, indicating a potential upside of 7.16%. Given Orchid Island Capital’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe Orchid Island Capital is more favorable than Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

35.3% of Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 32.7% of Orchid Island Capital shares are held by institutional investors. 40.6% of Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.6% of Orchid Island Capital shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Volatility and Risk

Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust has a beta of 1.51, indicating that its stock price is 51% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Orchid Island Capital has a beta of 1.83, indicating that its stock price is 83% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust and Orchid Island Capital”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust	$102.32 million	0.04	-$4.69 million	($1,554.97)	0.00
Orchid Island Capital	$177.57 million	4.66	$37.78 million	$0.60	14.78

Orchid Island Capital has higher revenue and earnings than Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust. Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Orchid Island Capital, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Profitability

This table compares Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust and Orchid Island Capital’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust	-29.69%	N/A	-4.57%
Orchid Island Capital	N/A	-2.01%	-0.23%

Summary

Orchid Island Capital beats Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust on 11 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust

Headquartered in Virginia Beach, Virginia, Wheeler Real Estate Investment Trust, Inc. is a fully integrated, self-managed commercial real estate investment trust (REIT) focused on owning and operating income-producing retail properties with a primary focus on grocery-anchored centers.

About Orchid Island Capital

Orchid Island Capital, Inc., a specialty finance company, invests in residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS) in the United States. The company’s RMBS is backed by single-family residential mortgage loans, referred as Agency RMBS. Its portfolio includes traditional pass-through Agency RMBS, such as mortgage pass through certificates and collateralized mortgage obligations; and structured Agency RMBS comprising interest only securities, inverse interest only securities, and principal only securities. The company has elected to be taxed as a real estate investment trust (REIT) for the United States federal income tax purposes. As a result, it would not be subject to corporate income tax on that portion of its net income that is distributed to stockholders, if it annually distributes dividends equal to at least 90% of its REIT taxable income to its stockholders. Orchid Island Capital, Inc. was incorporated in 2010 and is headquartered in Vero Beach, Florida.