AES (NYSE:AES) vs. Oklo (NYSE:OKLO) Head to Head Survey

Oklo (NYSE:OKLO) and AES (NYSE:AES) are both utilities companies, but which is the superior investment? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their profitability, analyst recommendations, earnings, institutional ownership, dividends, valuation and risk.

Volatility and Risk

Oklo has a beta of 1.2, suggesting that its share price is 20% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, AES has a beta of 0.97, suggesting that its share price is 3% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Oklo and AES”s gross revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Oklo	$1.21 million	4,135.44	-$105.66 million	($0.94)	-28.62
AES	$12.23 billion	0.87	$910.00 million	$2.62	5.71

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

Institutional and Insider Ownership

85.0% of Oklo shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 93.1% of AES shares are owned by institutional investors. 12.7% of Oklo shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 0.8% of AES shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Profitability

This table compares Oklo and AES’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Oklo	N/A	-7.11%	-6.92%
AES	14.30%	20.69%	3.62%

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of recent ratings and price targets for Oklo and AES, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Oklo	1	9	12	1	2.57
AES	0	7	0	0	2.00

Oklo presently has a consensus target price of $78.47, suggesting a potential upside of 191.71%. AES has a consensus target price of $15.83, suggesting a potential upside of 5.80%. Given Oklo’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities research analysts plainly believe Oklo is more favorable than AES.

Summary

AES beats Oklo on 8 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Oklo

Oklo Inc. designs and develops fission power plants to provide reliable and commercial-scale energy to customers in the United States. It also provides used nuclear fuel recycling services. The company was founded in 2013 and is based in Santa Clara, California.

About AES

The AES Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a diversified power generation and utility company in the United States and internationally. The company owns and/or operates power plants to generate and sell power to customers, such as utilities, industrial users, and other intermediaries; owns and/or operates utilities to generate or purchase, distribute, transmit, and sell electricity to end-user customers in the residential, commercial, industrial, and governmental sectors; and generates and sells electricity on the wholesale market. It uses various fuels and technologies to generate electricity, such as coal, gas, hydro, wind, solar, and biomass, as well as renewables comprising energy storage and landfill gas. The company owns and/or operates a generation portfolio of approximately 34,596 megawatts and distributes power to 2.6 million customers. The company was formerly known as Applied Energy Services, Inc. and changed its name to The AES Corporation in April 2000. The AES Corporation was incorporated in 1981 and is headquartered in Arlington, Virginia.