AMC Entertainment (NYSE:AMC – Get Free Report) and Lucky Strike Entertainment (NYSE:LUCK – Get Free Report) are both small-cap consumer discretionary companies, but which is the better business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, profitability, earnings, analyst recommendations, valuation, risk and dividends.
Analyst Recommendations
This is a breakdown of recent ratings and target prices for AMC Entertainment and Lucky Strike Entertainment, as provided by MarketBeat.com.
| Sell Ratings | Hold Ratings | Buy Ratings | Strong Buy Ratings | Rating Score | |
| AMC Entertainment | 2 | 6 | 1 | 0 | 1.89 |
| Lucky Strike Entertainment | 1 | 4 | 3 | 0 | 2.25 |
AMC Entertainment presently has a consensus price target of $3.26, suggesting a potential upside of 43.86%. Lucky Strike Entertainment has a consensus price target of $11.67, suggesting a potential upside of 56.60%. Given Lucky Strike Entertainment’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Lucky Strike Entertainment is more favorable than AMC Entertainment.
Earnings & Valuation
| Gross Revenue | Price/Sales Ratio | Net Income | Earnings Per Share | Price/Earnings Ratio | |
| AMC Entertainment | $4.87 billion | 0.24 | -$352.60 million | ($1.41) | -1.61 |
| Lucky Strike Entertainment | $1.20 billion | 0.87 | -$10.02 million | ($0.38) | -19.61 |
Lucky Strike Entertainment has lower revenue, but higher earnings than AMC Entertainment. Lucky Strike Entertainment is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than AMC Entertainment, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Profitability
This table compares AMC Entertainment and Lucky Strike Entertainment’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.
| Net Margins | Return on Equity | Return on Assets | |
| AMC Entertainment | -7.39% | N/A | -4.07% |
| Lucky Strike Entertainment | -3.80% | -23.31% | -1.95% |
Insider & Institutional Ownership
28.8% of AMC Entertainment shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 68.1% of Lucky Strike Entertainment shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.4% of AMC Entertainment shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 84.2% of Lucky Strike Entertainment shares are owned 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.
Dividends
AMC Entertainment pays an annual dividend of $0.04 per share and has a dividend yield of 1.8%. Lucky Strike Entertainment pays an annual dividend of $0.22 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.0%. AMC Entertainment pays out -2.8% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Lucky Strike Entertainment pays out -57.9% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Both companies have healthy payout ratios and should be able to cover their dividend payments with earnings for the next several years. Lucky Strike Entertainment is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.
Risk and Volatility
AMC Entertainment has a beta of 1.05, suggesting that its stock price is 5% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Lucky Strike Entertainment has a beta of 0.72, suggesting that its stock price is 28% less volatile than the S&P 500.
Summary
Lucky Strike Entertainment beats AMC Entertainment on 12 of the 16 factors compared between the two stocks.
About AMC Entertainment
AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc., through its subsidiaries, engages in the theatrical exhibition business. It owns, operates, or has interests in theatres in the United States and Europe. The company was founded in 1920 and is headquartered in Leawood, Kansas.
About Lucky Strike Entertainment
Lucky Strike Entertainment Corp. engages in operating bowling centers. It offers entertainment concepts with lounge seating, arcades, food and beverage offerings, and hosting and overseeing professional and non-professional bowling tournaments and related broadcasting. The company was founded by Thomas F. Shannon in 1997 and is headquartered in Mechanicsville, VA.
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