Invent Ventures (OTCMKTS:IDEA) & Sixth Street Specialty Lending (NYSE:TSLX) Critical Survey

Invent Ventures (OTCMKTS:IDEA) and Sixth Street Specialty Lending (NYSE:TSLX) are both finance companies, but which is the better business? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, earnings, risk, valuation, profitability, institutional ownership and dividends.

Profitability

This table compares Invent Ventures and Sixth Street Specialty Lending’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Invent Ventures	91.12%	N/A	N/A
Sixth Street Specialty Lending	39.56%	13.47%	6.17%

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Invent Ventures and Sixth Street Specialty Lending”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Invent Ventures	$790,000.00	1.27	$710,000.00	N/A	N/A
Sixth Street Specialty Lending	$482.53 million	4.45	$220.02 million	$2.01	11.34

Sixth Street Specialty Lending has higher revenue and earnings than Invent Ventures.

Volatility and Risk

Invent Ventures has a beta of -50.5, suggesting that its stock price is 5,150% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Sixth Street Specialty Lending has a beta of 0.85, suggesting that its stock price is 15% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of recent recommendations and price targets for Invent Ventures and Sixth Street Specialty Lending, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Invent Ventures	0	0	0	0	0.00
Sixth Street Specialty Lending	0	1	7	1	3.00

Sixth Street Specialty Lending has a consensus price target of $23.28, indicating a potential upside of 2.14%. Given Sixth Street Specialty Lending’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe Sixth Street Specialty Lending is more favorable than Invent Ventures.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

70.3% of Sixth Street Specialty Lending shares are held by institutional investors. 19.4% of Invent Ventures shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 3.3% of Sixth Street Specialty Lending shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Summary

Sixth Street Specialty Lending beats Invent Ventures on 11 of the 13 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Invent Ventures

Invent Ventures, Inc., formerly known as Los Angeles Syndicate of Technology, Inc., is venture capital firm specializing in incubation, seed, start ups, growth capital, and early stage investments. The firm prefers to invest in technology companies including web-based software, digital media, mobile applications, social media, consumer internet, online advertising and healthcare technology . It prefers to invest in the Los Angeles area of United States. The firm seeks to invest up to $0.25 million. Invent Ventures, Inc. was founded on August 18, 2005 and is based in Santa Monica, California.

About Sixth Street Specialty Lending

Sixth Street Specialty Lending, Inc. (NYSE: TSLX) is a business development company. The fund provides senior secured loans (first-lien, second-lien, and unitranche), unsecured loans, mezzanine debt, and investments in corporate bonds and equity securities and structured products, non-control structured equity, and common equity with a focus on co-investments for organic growth, acquisitions, market or product expansion, restructuring initiatives, recapitalizations, and refinancing. The fund invests in business services, software & technology, healthcare, energy, consumer & retail, manufacturing, industrials, royalty related businesses, education, and specialty finance. It seeks to finance and lending to middle market companies principally located in the United States. The fund invests in companies with enterprise value between $50 million and $1 billion or more and EBITDA between $10 million and $250 million. The transaction size is between $15 million and $350 million. The fund invests across the spectrum of the capital structure and can arrange syndicated transactions of up to $500 million and hold sizeable positions within its credits.