PJT Partners (NYSE:PJT) & Blackstone Secured Lending Fund (NYSE:BXSL) Financial Comparison

PJT Partners (NYSE:PJT) and Blackstone Secured Lending Fund (NYSE:BXSL) are both mid-cap finance companies, but which is the superior business? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their dividends, analyst recommendations, earnings, risk, profitability, valuation and institutional ownership.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

89.2% of PJT Partners shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 36.5% of Blackstone Secured Lending Fund shares are held by institutional investors. 11.0% of PJT Partners shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.1% of Blackstone Secured Lending Fund shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Profitability

This table compares PJT Partners and Blackstone Secured Lending Fund’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
PJT Partners	10.57%	32.66%	18.28%
Blackstone Secured Lending Fund	21.51%	11.86%	5.10%

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares PJT Partners and Blackstone Secured Lending Fund”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
PJT Partners	$1.71 billion	2.26	$180.12 million	$7.31	20.74
Blackstone Secured Lending Fund	$1.42 billion	4.05	$563.46 million	$1.27	19.44

Blackstone Secured Lending Fund has lower revenue, but higher earnings than PJT Partners. Blackstone Secured Lending Fund is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than PJT Partners, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of recent ratings and price targets for PJT Partners and Blackstone Secured Lending Fund, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
PJT Partners	1	3	3	0	2.29
Blackstone Secured Lending Fund	1	5	4	0	2.30

PJT Partners presently has a consensus target price of $177.50, suggesting a potential upside of 17.09%. Blackstone Secured Lending Fund has a consensus target price of $24.89, suggesting a potential upside of 0.79%. Given PJT Partners’ higher probable upside, equities analysts plainly believe PJT Partners is more favorable than Blackstone Secured Lending Fund.

Dividends

PJT Partners pays an annual dividend of $1.00 per share and has a dividend yield of 0.7%. Blackstone Secured Lending Fund pays an annual dividend of $3.08 per share and has a dividend yield of 12.5%. PJT Partners pays out 13.7% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Blackstone Secured Lending Fund pays out 242.5% 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 and Volatility

PJT Partners has a beta of 0.84, indicating that its stock price is 16% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Blackstone Secured Lending Fund has a beta of 0.39, indicating that its stock price is 61% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

PJT Partners beats Blackstone Secured Lending Fund on 10 of the 16 factors compared between the two stocks.

About PJT Partners

PJT Partners Inc., an investment bank, provides various strategic and capital markets advisory, restructuring and special situations, and shareholder advisory services to corporations, financial sponsors, institutional investors, and governments worldwide. It offers advisory services to clients on various transactions, including mergers and acquisitions (M&A), spin-offs, activism defense, contested M&A, joint ventures, minority investments, and divestitures. The company also advises private and public company boards and management teams on strategies for building productive investor relationships with a focus on shareholder engagement; and strategic investor relations; environmental, social, and governance matters; and other investor-related matters. In addition, it provides advisory services related to debt and acquisition financings; structured product offerings; public equity raises, including initial public offering and SPAC offerings; and private capital raises for early and later stage companies, as well as other capital structure related matters. Further, the company offers advisory services in financial restructurings and reorganizations; liability management; distressed mergers and acquisitions; and to management teams, corporate boards, sponsors and creditors. Additionally, it provides private fund advisory and fundraising services for a range of investment strategies; and advisory services to general and partners on liquidity and other structured solutions. The company was formerly known as Blackstone Advisory Inc. and changed its name to PJT Partners Inc. in March 2015. PJT Partners Inc. was incorporated in 2014 and is headquartered in New York, New York.

About Blackstone Secured Lending Fund

Blackstone Secured Lending Fund is business development company and a Delaware statutory trust formed on March 26, 2018, and structured as an externally managed, non-diversified closed-end investment Fund. On October 26, 2018, the fund elected to be regulated as a business development company (BDC) under the Investment Company Act of 1940, as amended (the 1940 Act). In addition, the Fund elected to be treated for U.S. federal income tax purposes, as a regulated investment company (RIC), as defined under Subchapter M of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as amended (the Code). The fund also intends to continue to comply with the requirements prescribed by the Code in order to maintain tax treatment as a RIC. The fund's investment objectives are to generate current income and, to a lesser extent, long-term capital appreciation. The Fund seeks to achieve its investment objective primarily through originated loans, equity and other securities, including syndicated loans, of private U.S. companies, specifically small and middle market companies, typically in the form of first lien senior secured and unitranche loans (including first out/last out loans), and to a lesser extent, second lien, third lien, unsecured and subordinated loans and other debt and equity securities.