Analyzing HeartCore Enterprises (NASDAQ:HTCR) and Agora (NASDAQ:API)

Agora (NASDAQ:API) and HeartCore Enterprises (NASDAQ:HTCR) are both small-cap technology companies, but which is the superior stock? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their valuation, profitability, risk, earnings, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations and dividends.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

40.4% of Agora shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 1.7% of HeartCore Enterprises shares are held by institutional investors. 36.1% of HeartCore Enterprises shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Profitability

This table compares Agora and HeartCore Enterprises’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Agora	7.23%	1.96%	1.52%
HeartCore Enterprises	15.42%	-138.90%	-53.97%

Volatility and Risk

Agora has a beta of 0.75, indicating that its share price is 25% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, HeartCore Enterprises has a beta of 1.67, indicating that its share price is 67% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent ratings and target prices for Agora and HeartCore Enterprises, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Agora	0	2	1	0	2.33
HeartCore Enterprises	1	1	0	0	1.50

Agora presently has a consensus price target of $6.80, indicating a potential upside of 66.67%. Given Agora’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Agora is more favorable than HeartCore Enterprises.

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Agora and HeartCore Enterprises”s gross revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Agora	$141.06 million	2.53	$9.53 million	$0.11	37.09
HeartCore Enterprises	$8.97 million	0.30	$5.79 million	($4.21)	-0.42

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

Summary

Agora beats HeartCore Enterprises on 11 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Agora

Agora, Inc. operates in real-time engagement technology business in the People's Republic of China, the United States, and internationally. The company offers real-time engagement platform-as-a-services providing developers with application programming interfaces to embed real-time voice, video, interactive live-streaming, chat, whiteboard, and artificial intelligence capabilities into their applications. It also provides video and voice calling, interactive live and broadcast streaming, chat, signaling, and interactive whiteboard products; and extensions, such as analytics, recording, AI noise suppression, 3D spatial audio, real-time transcription, and extensions marketplace. In addition, the company offers Application Platforms, including Flexible Classroom, a low-code application Platform as a Service, which combines video, voice, chat, signaling, whiteboard and recording functionalities into an integrated cloud-based solution for education providers; and App Builder, a no-code application platform, designed for developers with little or no coding experience to build their own applications with video conference and live streaming functionalities. It operates through Agora and Shengwang brands. Agora, Inc. was incorporated in 2013 and is headquartered in Santa Clara, California.

About HeartCore Enterprises

HeartCore Enterprises, Inc., a software development company, provides Software as a Service solutions to enterprise customers in Japan and internationally. Its customer experience management platform includes marketing, sales, service, and content management systems, as well as other tools and integrations, which enable companies to enhance the customer experience and drive engagement. The company also operates a digital transformation business that offers customers with robotics process automation, process mining, and task mining to accelerate the digital transformation of enterprises. In addition, it provides consulting services; and education, services, and support solutions. The company was founded in 2009 and is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan.