Critical Survey: Sotherly Hotels (NASDAQ:SOHOO) and Ashford Hospitality Trust (NYSE:AHT)

Sotherly Hotels (NASDAQ:SOHOO) and Ashford Hospitality Trust (NYSE:AHT) are both real estate companies, but which is the better business? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their institutional ownership, risk, analyst recommendations, profitability, dividends, earnings and valuation.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

41.0% of Ashford Hospitality Trust shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.2% of Ashford Hospitality Trust shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Profitability

This table compares Sotherly Hotels and Ashford Hospitality Trust’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Sotherly Hotels	N/A	N/A	N/A
Ashford Hospitality Trust	2.25%	-10.52%	0.82%

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Sotherly Hotels and Ashford Hospitality Trust”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Sotherly Hotels	$178.57 million	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Ashford Hospitality Trust	$1.28 billion	0.02	-$178.49 million	($3.17)	-0.19

Sotherly Hotels has higher earnings, but lower revenue than Ashford Hospitality Trust.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current recommendations and price targets for Sotherly Hotels and Ashford Hospitality Trust, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Sotherly Hotels	0	0	0	0	N/A
Ashford Hospitality Trust	0	1	0	0	2.00

Ashford Hospitality Trust has a consensus price target of $2.50, indicating a potential upside of 315.14%. Given Ashford Hospitality Trust’s higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Ashford Hospitality Trust is more favorable than Sotherly Hotels.

Dividends

Sotherly Hotels pays an annual dividend of $1.97 per share and has a dividend yield of 10.8%. Ashford Hospitality Trust pays an annual dividend of $0.24 per share and has a dividend yield of 39.9%. Ashford Hospitality Trust pays out -7.6% of its earnings in the form of a dividend.

Summary

Ashford Hospitality Trust beats Sotherly Hotels on 8 of the 9 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Sotherly Hotels

Sotherly Hotels Inc. is a self-managed and self-administered lodging REIT focused on the acquisition, renovation, upbranding and repositioning of upscale to upper-upscale full-service hotels in the Southern United States. Sotherly may also opportunistically acquire hotels throughout the United States. Currently, the Company's portfolio consists of investments in ten hotel properties, comprising 2,786 rooms, as well as interests in two condominium hotels and their associated rental programs. The Company owns hotels that operate under the Hilton Worldwide and Hyatt Hotels Corporation brands, as well as independent hotels. Sotherly Hotels Inc. was organized in 2004 and is headquartered in Williamsburg, Virginia.

About Ashford Hospitality Trust

Ashford Hospitality Trust, Inc., together with its subsidiaries (Ashford Trust), is a real estate investment trust (REIT). While our portfolio currently consists of upscale hotels and upper upscale full-service hotels, our investment strategy is predominantly focused on investing in upper upscale full-service hotels in the United States that have revenue per available room (RevPAR) generally less than twice the U.S. national average, and in all methods including direct real estate, equity, and debt. We currently anticipate future investments will predominantly be in upper upscale hotels. We own our lodging investments and conduct our business through Ashford Hospitality Limited Partnership (Ashford Trust OP), our operating partnership. Ashford OP General Partner LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Ashford Trust, serves as the sole general partner of our operating partnership.