Head to Head Review: Global Partners (NYSE:GLP) and CVR Energy (NYSE:CVI)

CVR Energy (NYSE:CVI) and Global Partners (NYSE:GLP) are both energy companies, but which is the better business? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, risk, earnings, profitability, dividends, valuation and institutional ownership.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent ratings and price targets for CVR Energy and Global Partners, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
CVR Energy	5	3	0	0	1.38
Global Partners	0	2	1	0	2.33

CVR Energy presently has a consensus price target of $30.50, suggesting a potential downside of 38.65%. Global Partners has a consensus price target of $46.00, suggesting a potential downside of 13.13%. Given Global Partners’ stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Global Partners is more favorable than CVR Energy.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares CVR Energy and Global Partners”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
CVR Energy	$7.16 billion	0.70	$27.00 million	$0.68	73.11
Global Partners	$18.56 billion	0.10	$79.22 million	$4.91	10.79

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

Volatility and Risk

CVR Energy has a beta of 0.85, indicating that its share price is 15% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Global Partners has a beta of 1.06, indicating that its share price is 6% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares CVR Energy and Global Partners’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
CVR Energy	0.81%	-15.21%	-3.33%
Global Partners	0.91%	30.87%	4.92%

Institutional and Insider Ownership

98.9% of CVR Energy shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 38.1% of Global Partners shares are owned by institutional investors. 70.8% of CVR Energy shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 41.5% of Global Partners shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Dividends

CVR Energy pays an annual dividend of $0.40 per share and has a dividend yield of 0.8%. Global Partners pays an annual dividend of $3.12 per share and has a dividend yield of 5.9%. CVR Energy pays out 58.8% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Global Partners pays out 63.5% 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. CVR Energy has increased its dividend for 1 consecutive years and Global Partners has increased its dividend for 5 consecutive years. Global Partners is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.

Summary

Global Partners beats CVR Energy on 12 of the 17 factors compared between the two stocks.

About CVR Energy

CVR Energy, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, engages in the petroleum refining and marketing, and nitrogen fertilizer manufacturing activities in the United States. It operates in two segments, Petroleum and Nitrogen Fertilizer. The Petroleum segment refines and supplies gasoline, crude oil, distillate, diesel fuel, and other refined products. This segment also owns and operates a coking medium-sour crude oil refinery in southeast Kansas; and a crude oil refinery in Wynnewood, Oklahoma, as well as supporting logistics assets. This segment primarily serves retailers, railroads, farm cooperatives, and other refiners/marketers. The Nitrogen Fertilizer segment owns and operates a nitrogen fertilizer plant in North America that utilizes a pet coke gasification process to produce nitrogen fertilizer products; and a nitrogen fertilizer facility in East Dubuque, Illinois that produces nitrogen fertilizers in the form of ammonia and urea ammonium nitrate (UAN), nitric acid, and liquid and granulated urea. This segment primarily markets UAN products to agricultural customers; and ammonia products to agricultural and industrial customers. The company was founded in 1906 and is based in Sugar Land, Texas. CVR Energy, Inc. is a subsidiary of Icahn Enterprises L.P.

About Global Partners

Global Partners LP engages in the purchasing, selling, gathering, blending, storing, and logistics of transporting gasoline and gasoline blendstocks, distillates, residual oil, renewable fuels, crude oil, and propane to wholesalers, retailers, and commercial customers. The company operates through three segments: Wholesale, Gasoline Distribution and Station Operations, and Commercial. The Wholesale segment sells home heating oil, branded and unbranded gasoline and gasoline blendstocks, diesel, kerosene, and residual oil to home heating oil and propane retailers and wholesale distributors. This segment also transports the products by railcars, barges, trucks and/or pipelines. Its Gasoline Distribution and Station Operations segment sells branded and unbranded gasoline to gasoline station operators and sub-jobbers; operates gasoline stations and convenience stores; and provides car wash, lottery, and ATM services, as well as leases gasoline stations. The Commercial segment sells and delivers unbranded gasoline, home heating oil, diesel, kerosene, residual oil, and bunker fuel to customers in the public sector, as well as to commercial and industrial end-users; and sells custom blended fuels. The company is also involved in the transportation of petroleum products and renewable fuels through rail from the mid-continent region of the United States and Canada. Global Partners LP was founded in 2005 and is based in Waltham, Massachusetts.