Carnival (NYSE:CUK) vs. Flight Centre (OTCMKTS:FGETF) Critical Survey

Flight Centre (OTCMKTS:FGETF) and Carnival (NYSE:CUK) are both consumer discretionary companies, but which is the better investment? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their profitability, dividends, analyst recommendations, risk, institutional ownership, earnings and valuation.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

23.8% of Carnival shares are held by institutional investors. 0.1% of Carnival shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Risk & Volatility

Flight Centre has a beta of -0.04, meaning that its stock price is 104% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Carnival has a beta of 2.75, meaning that its stock price is 175% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent ratings and recommmendations for Flight Centre and Carnival, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Flight Centre	0	0	1	0	3.00
Carnival	0	1	0	0	2.00

Profitability

This table compares Flight Centre and Carnival’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Flight Centre	N/A	N/A	N/A
Carnival	10.07%	27.86%	5.64%

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Flight Centre and Carnival”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Flight Centre	$1.80 billion	0.99	$70.90 million	N/A	N/A
Carnival	$25.02 billion	0.19	$1.92 billion	$1.92	13.32

Carnival has higher revenue and earnings than Flight Centre.

Summary

Carnival beats Flight Centre on 8 of the 11 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Flight Centre

Flight Centre Travel Group Limited provides travel retailing services for the leisure and corporate sectors in Australia, New Zealand, the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia, and internationally. The company offers leisure travel services for the niche sectors, as well as mass, youth, premium, and cruise markets; and corporate travel services for organizations of various sizes across industries, as well as supplies products to its national and international network, or travel retail outlets. It also provides tour operations, hotel management, and destination management services. In addition, the company offers other travel related services, including foreign currency exchange and travel academies; recruitment marketing and bike retailing; and employee benefit services. It provides its services primarily under the Flight Centre brand, as well as other travel brands, such as Student Flights, Travel Associates, Liberty Travel, Infinity Holidays, GOGO Vacations, FCm Travel Solutions, Corporate Traveller, Stage and Screen, and cievents. The company was formerly known as Flight Centre Limited and changed its name to Flight Centre Travel Group Limited in November 2013. The company was incorporated in 1987 and is headquartered in South Brisbane, Australia.

About Carnival

Carnival Plc operates as a global cruise and vacation company. The firm offers holiday and vacation products to a customer base that is broadly varied in terms of cultures, languages and leisure-time preferences. It operates through the North America and Australia (NAA), Europe and Asia (EA), Cruise Support, and Tour and Other segments. The NAA segment includes Carnival Cruise Line, Holland America Line, P and O Cruises (Australia), Princess and Seabourn. The EA segment includes AIDA, Costa, Cunard, and P and O Cruises (UK). The Cruise Support segment includes a portfolio of port destinations and other services, all of which are operated for the benefit of cruise brands. The Tour and Other segment represents the hotel and transportation operations of Holland America Princess Alaska Tours and other operations. The company was founded on July 19, 2000 and is headquartered in Southampton, the United Kingdom.