Crown Castle (CCI) Competitors

Crown Castle (NYSE:CCI) and SBA Communications (NASDAQ:SBAC) are both large-cap finance companies, but which is the better business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their valuation, earnings, profitability, dividends, analyst recommendations, community ranking, risk, media sentiment and institutional ownership.

Is CCI or SBAC more profitable?

SBA Communications has a net margin of 25.76% compared to Crown Castle's net margin of 18.59%. Crown Castle's return on equity of 20.98% beat SBA Communications' return on equity.

Company	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Crown Castle	18.59%	20.98%	3.20%
SBA Communications	25.76%	-13.13%	6.83%

Is CCI or SBAC a better dividend stock?

Crown Castle pays an annual dividend of $6.26 per share and has a dividend yield of 5.9%. SBA Communications pays an annual dividend of $4.44 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.8%. Crown Castle pays out -58.2% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. SBA Communications pays out 60.9% 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. Crown Castle is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.

Do analysts rate CCI or SBAC?

Crown Castle currently has a consensus target price of $111.18, suggesting a potential upside of 4.57%. SBA Communications has a consensus target price of $252.38, suggesting a potential upside of 4.84%. Given SBA Communications' stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe SBA Communications is more favorable than Crown Castle.

Company	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Crown Castle	0 Sell rating(s)	11 Hold rating(s)	6 Buy rating(s)	2 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.53
SBA Communications	0 Sell rating(s)	5 Hold rating(s)	7 Buy rating(s)	2 Strong Buy rating(s)	2.79

Do institutionals and insiders believe in CCI or SBAC?

90.8% of Crown Castle shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 97.3% of SBA Communications shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.1% of Crown Castle shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 0.9% of SBA Communications shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Does the media prefer CCI or SBAC?

In the previous week, SBA Communications had 19 more articles in the media than Crown Castle. MarketBeat recorded 51 mentions for SBA Communications and 32 mentions for Crown Castle. SBA Communications' average media sentiment score of 1.09 beat Crown Castle's score of 1.06 indicating that SBA Communications is being referred to more favorably in the news media.

Company	Very Positive	Positive	Neutral	Negative	Very Negative	Overall Sentiment
Crown Castle	19 Very Positive mention(s)	0 Positive mention(s)	7 Neutral mention(s)	1 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Positive
SBA Communications	24 Very Positive mention(s)	8 Positive mention(s)	8 Neutral mention(s)	1 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Positive

Which has better valuation & earnings, CCI or SBAC?

Crown Castle has higher revenue and earnings than SBA Communications. Crown Castle is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than SBA Communications, 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
Crown Castle	$6.57B	7.05	$1.50B	-$10.76	-9.88
SBA Communications	$2.69B	9.65	$501.81M	$7.29	33.02

Which has more risk and volatility, CCI or SBAC?

Crown Castle has a beta of 0.93, suggesting that its share price is 7% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, SBA Communications has a beta of 0.83, suggesting that its share price is 17% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Does the MarketBeat Community prefer CCI or SBAC?

SBA Communications received 72 more outperform votes than Crown Castle when rated by MarketBeat users. However, 67.79% of users gave Crown Castle an outperform vote while only 67.09% of users gave SBA Communications an outperform vote.

Company	Underperform	Outperform
Crown Castle	Outperform Votes 766 67.79%	Underperform Votes 364 32.21%
SBA Communications	Outperform Votes 838 67.09%	Underperform Votes 411 32.91%

Summary

SBA Communications beats Crown Castle on 13 of the 20 factors compared between the two stocks.