Head-To-Head Analysis: Applied Digital (NASDAQ:APLD) vs. HeartCore Enterprises (NASDAQ:HTCR)

Applied Digital (NASDAQ:APLD) and HeartCore Enterprises (NASDAQ:HTCR) are both small-cap finance companies, but which is the superior investment? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, risk, earnings, profitability, institutional ownership, valuation and dividends.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

65.7% of Applied Digital shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 1.7% of HeartCore Enterprises shares are held by institutional investors. 11.8% of Applied Digital shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 64.2% of HeartCore Enterprises shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Risk and Volatility

Applied Digital has a beta of 4.69, meaning that its stock price is 369% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, HeartCore Enterprises has a beta of 1.75, meaning that its stock price is 75% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Applied Digital and HeartCore Enterprises”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Applied Digital	$211.62 million	7.37	-$149.27 million	($1.73)	-4.05
HeartCore Enterprises	$30.29 million	0.64	-$4.19 million	$0.24	3.88

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

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent ratings for Applied Digital and HeartCore Enterprises, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Applied Digital	0	0	9	0	3.00
HeartCore Enterprises	0	0	0	0	0.00

Applied Digital presently has a consensus price target of $12.11, suggesting a potential upside of 73.02%. Given Applied Digital’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, research analysts clearly believe Applied Digital is more favorable than HeartCore Enterprises.

Profitability

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

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Applied Digital	-127.86%	-117.67%	-27.84%
HeartCore Enterprises	16.25%	65.33%	22.92%

About Applied Digital

Applied Digital Corporation designs, develops, and operates datacenters in North America. Its datacenters provide digital infrastructure solutions to the high-performance computing industry. The company also provides artificial intelligence cloud services, high performance computing datacenter hosting, and crypto datacenter hosting services. The company was formerly known as Applied Blockchain, Inc. and changed its name to Applied Digital Corporation in November 2022. Applied Digital Corporation is based in Dallas, Texas.

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.