Natural Gas Services Group (NGS) Competitors

RPC (NYSE:RES) and Natural Gas Services Group (NYSE:NGS) are both small-cap energy companies, but which is the superior business? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their media sentiment, earnings, analyst recommendations, dividends, risk, institutional ownership, profitability and valuation.

Is RES or NGS a better dividend stock?

RPC pays an annual dividend of $0.16 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.6%. Natural Gas Services Group pays an annual dividend of $0.40 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.6%. RPC pays out 61.5% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Natural Gas Services Group pays out 29.6% 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.

Do institutionals & insiders hold more shares of RES or NGS?

41.1% of RPC shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 65.6% of Natural Gas Services Group shares are owned by institutional investors. 60.5% of RPC shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 7.3% of Natural Gas Services Group shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Is RES or NGS more profitable?

Natural Gas Services Group has a net margin of 10.53% compared to RPC's net margin of 3.77%. Natural Gas Services Group's return on equity of 6.99% beat RPC's return on equity.

Company	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
RPC	3.77%	5.65%	4.42%
Natural Gas Services Group	10.53%	6.99%	3.57%

Do analysts recommend RES or NGS?

RPC currently has a consensus price target of $4.94, indicating a potential upside of 10.58%. Natural Gas Services Group has a consensus price target of $32.50, indicating a potential upside of 29.15%. Given Natural Gas Services Group's stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Natural Gas Services Group is more favorable than RPC.

Company	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
RPC	1 Sell rating(s)	3 Hold rating(s)	0 Buy rating(s)	0 Strong Buy rating(s)	1.75
Natural Gas Services Group	0 Sell rating(s)	0 Hold rating(s)	1 Buy rating(s)	1 Strong Buy rating(s)	3.50

Which has more risk and volatility, RES or NGS?

RPC has a beta of 0.88, indicating that its share price is 12% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Natural Gas Services Group has a beta of 0.66, indicating that its share price is 34% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Which has higher earnings & valuation, RES or NGS?

RPC has higher revenue and earnings than Natural Gas Services Group. RPC is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Natural Gas Services Group, 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
RPC	$1.42B	0.70	$91.44M	$0.26	17.17
Natural Gas Services Group	$156.74M	2.01	$17.23M	$1.35	18.64

Does the media prefer RES or NGS?

In the previous week, Natural Gas Services Group had 3 more articles in the media than RPC. MarketBeat recorded 4 mentions for Natural Gas Services Group and 1 mentions for RPC. Natural Gas Services Group's average media sentiment score of 0.38 beat RPC's score of 0.00 indicating that Natural Gas Services Group is being referred to more favorably in the news media.

Company	Very Positive	Positive	Neutral	Negative	Very Negative	Overall Sentiment
RPC	0 Very Positive mention(s)	0 Positive mention(s)	1 Neutral mention(s)	0 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Neutral
Natural Gas Services Group	0 Very Positive mention(s)	2 Positive mention(s)	2 Neutral mention(s)	0 Negative mention(s)	0 Very Negative mention(s)	Neutral

Summary

Natural Gas Services Group beats RPC on 13 of the 19 factors compared between the two stocks.