Aaron's (AAN) Competitors

Haverty Furniture Companies (NYSE:HVT) and Aaron's (NYSE:AAN) are both small-cap retail/wholesale companies, but which is the better investment? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their community ranking, risk, dividends, profitability, earnings, analyst recommendations, institutional ownership, valuation and media sentiment.

Do institutionals and insiders hold more shares of HVT or AAN?

80.6% of Haverty Furniture Companies shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 92.0% of Aaron's shares are owned by institutional investors. 8.9% of Haverty Furniture Companies shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 3.5% of Aaron's shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Do analysts prefer HVT or AAN?

Haverty Furniture Companies presently has a consensus target price of $45.00, suggesting a potential upside of 60.60%. Aaron's has a consensus target price of $11.50, suggesting a potential upside of 42.15%. Given Aaron's' stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities research analysts clearly believe Haverty Furniture Companies is more favorable than Aaron's.

Company	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Haverty Furniture Companies	0 Sell rating(s)	0 Hold rating(s)	1 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	3.00
Aaron's	0 Sell rating(s)	4 Hold rating(s)	2 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.33

Is HVT or AAN a better dividend stock?

Haverty Furniture Companies pays an annual dividend of $1.28 per share and has a dividend yield of 4.6%. Aaron's pays an annual dividend of $0.50 per share and has a dividend yield of 6.2%. Haverty Furniture Companies pays out 46.5% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Aaron's pays out -63.3% 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. Haverty Furniture Companies has raised its dividend for 4 consecutive years and Aaron's has raised its dividend for 2 consecutive years. Aaron's is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.

Does the media favor HVT or AAN?

In the previous week, Aaron's had 10 more articles in the media than Haverty Furniture Companies. MarketBeat recorded 13 mentions for Aaron's and 3 mentions for Haverty Furniture Companies. Haverty Furniture Companies' average media sentiment score of 0.41 beat Aaron's' score of 0.12 indicating that Aaron's is being referred to more favorably in the news media.

Company	Very Positive	Positive	Neutral	Negative	Very Negative	Overall Sentiment
Haverty Furniture Companies	0 Very Positive mention(s)	0 Positive mention(s)	2 Neutral mention(s)	0 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Neutral
Aaron's	3 Very Positive mention(s)	3 Positive mention(s)	2 Neutral mention(s)	0 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Neutral

Does the MarketBeat Community favor HVT or AAN?

Aaron's received 145 more outperform votes than Haverty Furniture Companies when rated by MarketBeat users. Likewise, 70.47% of users gave Aaron's an outperform vote while only 64.47% of users gave Haverty Furniture Companies an outperform vote.

Company	Underperform	Outperform
Haverty Furniture Companies	Outperform Votes 392 64.47%	Underperform Votes 216 35.53%
Aaron's	Outperform Votes 537 70.47%	Underperform Votes 225 29.53%

Which has more volatility & risk, HVT or AAN?

Haverty Furniture Companies has a beta of 1.54, suggesting that its share price is 54% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Aaron's has a beta of 1.31, suggesting that its share price is 31% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Which has better valuation and earnings, HVT or AAN?

Haverty Furniture Companies has higher earnings, but lower revenue than Aaron's. Aaron's is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Haverty Furniture Companies, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Company	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Haverty Furniture Companies	$862.13M	0.53	$56.32M	$2.75	10.23
Aaron's	$2.14B	0.12	$2.82M	-$0.79	-10.24

Is HVT or AAN more profitable?

Haverty Furniture Companies has a net margin of 5.64% compared to Haverty Furniture Companies' net margin of -1.15%. Aaron's' return on equity of 14.98% beat Haverty Furniture Companies' return on equity.

Company	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Haverty Furniture Companies	5.64%	14.98%	7.05%
Aaron's	-1.15%	0.02%	0.01%

Summary

Haverty Furniture Companies beats Aaron's on 12 of the 21 factors compared between the two stocks.