Reviewing Brand Engagement Network (NASDAQ:BNAI) & Digimarc (NASDAQ:DMRC)

Brand Engagement Network (NASDAQ:BNAI) and Digimarc (NASDAQ:DMRC) are both small-cap business services companies, but which is the superior stock? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their risk, institutional ownership, dividends, profitability, analyst recommendations, earnings and valuation.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current ratings for Brand Engagement Network and Digimarc, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Brand Engagement Network	0	0	1	0	3.00
Digimarc	0	1	1	0	2.50

Brand Engagement Network presently has a consensus target price of $6.00, indicating a potential upside of 237.08%. Digimarc has a consensus target price of $34.00, indicating a potential upside of 18.01%. Given Brand Engagement Network’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities research analysts plainly believe Brand Engagement Network is more favorable than Digimarc.

Profitability

This table compares Brand Engagement Network and Digimarc’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Brand Engagement Network	N/A	N/A	-28.36%
Digimarc	-114.38%	-46.01%	-36.78%

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Brand Engagement Network and Digimarc’s gross revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Brand Engagement Network	$35,210.00	1,684.55	-$6.88 million	N/A	N/A
Digimarc	$38.60 million	15.95	-$45.96 million	($2.08)	-13.85

Brand Engagement Network has higher earnings, but lower revenue than Digimarc.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

15.8% of Brand Engagement Network shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 66.8% of Digimarc shares are owned by institutional investors. 62.9% of Brand Engagement Network shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 19.3% of Digimarc shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Risk and Volatility

Brand Engagement Network has a beta of 0.8, meaning that its share price is 20% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Digimarc has a beta of 1.73, meaning that its share price is 73% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Brand Engagement Network beats Digimarc on 8 of the 11 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Brand Engagement Network

Brand Engagement Network, Inc. provides conversational AI assistants. The company offers security-focused, multimodal communication, and human-like assistants. Its AI assistants are built on proprietary natural language processing, anomaly detection, multisensory awareness, sentiment, and environmental analysis, as well as real-time individuation and personalization capabilities. It serves the automotive, healthcare, and other industries through direct sales force and channel partners. Brand Engagement Network, Inc. was formerly known as Blockchain Exchange Network Inc. and changed its name to Brand Engagement Network, Inc. in April 2023. The company was founded in 2018 and is based in Jackson, Wyoming.

About Digimarc

Digimarc Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides automatic identification solutions to commercial and government customers in the United States and internationally. The company offers Digimarc Validate protects, a cloud-based record of product authentication information; Digimarc Engage, an interactive communications channel connecting brands and consumers; and Digimarc Recycle. Its solutions are used in various application solutions, such as sorting of consumer-packaged goods in recycling streams. The company offers its solutions through its sales personnel and business partners. Digimarc Corporation was incorporated in 2008 and is based in Beaverton, Oregon.