Reviewing Adecoagro (NYSE:AGRO) and Seneca Foods (NASDAQ:SENEB)

Adecoagro (NYSE:AGRO) and Seneca Foods (NASDAQ:SENEB) are both consumer staples companies, but which is the better investment? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their dividends, earnings, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, risk, valuation and profitability.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

45.3% of Adecoagro shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 3.4% of Seneca Foods shares are owned by institutional investors. 6.7% of Adecoagro shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 1.6% of Seneca Foods shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of recent ratings and recommmendations for Adecoagro and Seneca Foods, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Adecoagro	2	5	1	0	1.88
Seneca Foods	0	1	0	0	2.00

Adecoagro currently has a consensus price target of $11.62, indicating a potential upside of 15.76%. Given Adecoagro’s higher possible upside, equities research analysts clearly believe Adecoagro is more favorable than Seneca Foods.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Adecoagro and Seneca Foods”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Adecoagro	$1.43 billion	1.00	-$8.35 million	$0.33	30.41
Seneca Foods	$1.77 billion	N/A	N/A	$3.08	57.80

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

Profitability

This table compares Adecoagro and Seneca Foods’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Adecoagro	3.03%	-0.38%	-0.14%
Seneca Foods	N/A	N/A	N/A

Summary

Seneca Foods beats Adecoagro on 6 of the 11 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Adecoagro

Adecoagro S.A. operates as an agro-industrial company in South America. The company mainly operates through three segments: Farming; Sugar, Ethanol and Energy; and Land Transformation. It engages in farming crops, rice and other agricultural products, dairy operations, and land transformation activities, as well as sugar, ethanol, and energy production activities. The company is involved in the planting, harvesting, and sale of grains, oilseeds, and fibers, including wheat, corn, soybeans, peanuts, cotton, sunflowers, and others; provision of grain warehousing/conditioning, handling, and drying services to third parties; and purchase and sale of crops produced by third parties. It also plants, harvests, processes, and markets rice; and produces and sells raw milk, UHT, cheese, and powder milk. In addition, the company engages in the cultivating and transforming of sugarcane into ethanol, sugar, and electricity. Further, it is involved in the identification and acquisition of underdeveloped and undermanaged farmland, and the realization of value through the strategic disposition of assets. Adecoagro S.A. was founded in 2002 and is based in Luxembourg, Luxembourg.

About Seneca Foods

Seneca Foods Corporation provides packaged fruits and vegetables in the United States and internationally. The company offers canned, frozen, and bottled produce; and snack chips and other food products under the private label, as well as under various national and regional brands that the company owns or licenses, including Seneca, Libby's, Aunt Nellie's, READ, Green Valley, Paradise, Seneca Farms, and CherryMan. It also packs Green Giant, Le Sueur, and other brands of canned vegetables, as well as select Green Giant frozen vegetables for B&G Foods North America under a contract packing agreement. In addition, the company engages in the sale of cans and ends, as well as trucking and aircraft operations. It provides its products to grocery outlets, including supermarkets, mass merchandisers, limited assortment stores, club stores, and dollar stores; and food service distributors, industrial markets, other food packagers, and export customers in 90 countries, as well as federal, state, and local governments for school and other feeding programs. The company was founded in 1949 and is headquartered in Marion, New York.