Critical Survey: Spok (NASDAQ:SPOK) & TIM (NYSE:TIMB)

TIM (NYSE:TIMB) and Spok (NASDAQ:SPOK) are both communication services companies, but which is the better investment? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their earnings, profitability, risk, analyst recommendations, dividends, valuation and institutional ownership.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

50.8% of Spok shares are held by institutional investors. 7.3% of Spok shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Dividends

TIM pays an annual dividend of $1.04 per share and has a dividend yield of 5.7%. Spok pays an annual dividend of $1.25 per share and has a dividend yield of 12.1%. TIM pays out 61.5% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Spok pays out 215.5% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future.

Risk & Volatility

TIM has a beta of 0.38, suggesting that its stock price is 62% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Spok has a beta of 0.45, suggesting that its stock price is 55% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current ratings and target prices for TIM and Spok, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
TIM	1	9	2	1	2.23
Spok	0	2	0	0	2.00

TIM currently has a consensus price target of $24.82, suggesting a potential upside of 35.50%. Spok has a consensus price target of $14.00, suggesting a potential upside of 35.27%. Given TIM’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities research analysts clearly believe TIM is more favorable than Spok.

Profitability

This table compares TIM and Spok’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
TIM	15.73%	17.99%	7.74%
Spok	9.00%	8.50%	6.08%

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares TIM and Spok”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
TIM	$4.77 billion	1.86	$772.28 million	$1.69	10.84
Spok	$135.97 million	1.59	$15.88 million	$0.58	17.84

TIM has higher revenue and earnings than Spok. TIM is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Spok, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Summary

TIM beats Spok on 12 of the 17 factors compared between the two stocks.

About TIM

TIM S.A., a telecommunications company, provides mobile voice, data, and broadband services in Brazil. The company offers in mobile, landline, long-distance, and data transmission services. It also offers fixed ultra-broadband, fixed ultraband broadband, and digital content services. The company serves individuals and corporates, as well as small, medium, and large companies. TIM S.A is based in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The company operates as a subsidiary of TIM Brasil Serviços e Participações S.A.

About Spok

Spok Holdings, Inc., through its subsidiary, Spok, Inc., provides healthcare communication solutions in the United States, Europe, Canada, Australia, Asia, and the Middle East. The company's products and services enhance workflows for clinicians and support administrative compliance. It delivers clinical information to care teams when and where it matters to enhance patient outcomes; and provides GenA Pager, a one-way alphanumeric pager. The company offers subscriptions to one-way or two-way messaging services, as well as alphanumeric pagers that are configurable to support unencrypted or encrypted operation; and ancillary services, such as voicemail, and equipment loss or maintenance protection services, as well as sells devices to resellers who lease or resell them to their subscribers. Its Spok Care Connect suite products for contact centers, clinical alerting and notification, mobile communications and messaging, and public safety notifications. In addition, the company provides professional, software license updates, and product support services, as well as sells third-party equipment. It serves businesses, professionals, management personnel, medical personnel, field sales personnel and service forces, members of the construction industry and construction trades, real estate brokers and developers, sales and services organizations, specialty trade organizations, manufacturing organizations, and government agencies. The company was formerly known as USA Mobility, Inc. and changed its name to Spok Holdings, Inc. in July 2014. Spok Holdings, Inc. was founded in 1986 and is headquartered in Alexandria, Virginia.