Head-To-Head Contrast: BOK Financial (NASDAQ:BOKF) & Pathward Financial (NASDAQ:CASH)

BOK Financial (NASDAQ:BOKF) and Pathward Financial (NASDAQ:CASH) are both finance companies, but which is the superior investment? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, risk, dividends, analyst recommendations, profitability, earnings and valuation.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent ratings and recommmendations for BOK Financial and Pathward Financial, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
BOK Financial	0	9	1	0	2.10
Pathward Financial	0	1	1	0	2.50

BOK Financial currently has a consensus target price of $97.10, suggesting a potential upside of 5.49%. Pathward Financial has a consensus target price of $63.00, suggesting a potential upside of 14.03%. Given Pathward Financial’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts plainly believe Pathward Financial is more favorable than BOK Financial.

Profitability

This table compares BOK Financial and Pathward Financial’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
BOK Financial	13.93%	10.52%	1.06%
Pathward Financial	22.90%	25.09%	2.31%

Risk and Volatility

BOK Financial has a beta of 1.2, meaning that its share price is 20% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Pathward Financial has a beta of 0.66, meaning that its share price is 34% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Dividends

BOK Financial pays an annual dividend of $2.20 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.4%. Pathward Financial pays an annual dividend of $0.20 per share and has a dividend yield of 0.4%. BOK Financial pays out 32.1% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Pathward Financial pays out 3.0% 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. BOK Financial has increased its dividend for 19 consecutive years. BOK Financial is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

34.4% of BOK Financial shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 92.7% of Pathward Financial shares are held by institutional investors. 56.9% of BOK Financial shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.7% of Pathward Financial shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Valuation & Earnings

This table compares BOK Financial and Pathward Financial’s gross revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
BOK Financial	$3.13 billion	1.90	$530.75 million	$6.86	13.42
Pathward Financial	$715.33 million	1.95	$163.62 million	$6.66	8.30

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

About BOK Financial

BOK Financial Corporation operates as the financial holding company for BOKF, NA that provides various financial products and services in Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Northwest Arkansas, Colorado, Arizona, and Kansas/Missouri. It operates through three segments: Commercial Banking, Consumer Banking, and Wealth Management. The Commercial Banking segment offers lending, treasury, cash management, and customer commodity risk management products for small businesses, middle market, and larger commercial customers, as well as operates TransFund electronic funds transfer network. The Consumer Banking segment engages in the provision of retail lending and deposit services to small business customers through retail branch network; and mortgage loan origination and servicing activities. The Wealth Management segment offers fiduciary, private bank, insurance, and investment advisory services; and brokerage and trading services primarily related to providing liquidity to the mortgage markets through trading of U.S. government agency mortgage-backed securities and related derivative contracts, as well as underwrites state and municipal securities. The company also provides commercial loans, such as loans for working capital, facilities acquisition or expansion, purchases of equipment, and other needs of commercial customers; and service, healthcare, manufacturing, wholesale/retail, energy, and other sector loans. In addition, it offers commercial real estate loans for the construction of buildings or other improvements to real estate and property held by borrowers for investment purposes; residential mortgage and personal loans; and automated teller machine, call center, and Internet and mobile banking services. The company was founded in 1910 and is headquartered in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

About Pathward Financial

Pathward Financial, Inc. operates as the bank holding company for Pathward, National Association that provides various banking products and services in the United States. The company operates through three segments: Consumer, Commercial, and Corporate Services/Other. It offers demand deposit accounts, savings accounts, and money market savings accounts. The company also provides commercial finance product comprising term lending, asset-based lending, factoring, lease financing, insurance premium finance, government guaranteed lending, and other commercial finance products; consumer credit products; other consumer financing services; tax services, which includes short-term refund advance loans and short-term electronic return originator advance loans; and warehouse financing services. In addition, it issues prepaid cards; and offers payment solutions, such as acceptance, processing, and settlement of credit card and debit card payments. The company was formerly known as Meta Financial Group, Inc. and changed its name to Pathward Financial, Inc. in July 2022. Pathward Financial, Inc. was founded in 1954 and is based in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.