Head to Head Comparison: Dawson Geophysical (NASDAQ:DWSN) versus Halliburton (NYSE:HAL)

Dawson Geophysical (NASDAQ:DWSN) and Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) are both energy companies, but which is the better business? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their institutional ownership, earnings, valuation, profitability, dividends, risk and analyst recommendations.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent recommendations and price targets for Dawson Geophysical and Halliburton, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Dawson Geophysical	0	1	0	0	2.00
Halliburton	0	6	17	2	2.84

Halliburton has a consensus price target of $32.50, indicating a potential upside of 15.44%. Given Halliburton’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, analysts clearly believe Halliburton is more favorable than Dawson Geophysical.

Volatility & Risk

Dawson Geophysical has a beta of -0.1, indicating that its share price is 110% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Halliburton has a beta of 0.81, indicating that its share price is 19% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares Dawson Geophysical and Halliburton’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Dawson Geophysical	-5.15%	-19.72%	-8.81%
Halliburton	5.91%	20.12%	8.29%

Institutional & Insider Ownership

7.9% of Dawson Geophysical shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 85.2% of Halliburton shares are held by institutional investors. 0.3% of Dawson Geophysical shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 0.6% of Halliburton shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Dawson Geophysical and Halliburton”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Dawson Geophysical	$74.15 million	0.70	-$4.12 million	($0.12)	-13.92
Halliburton	$22.94 billion	1.03	$2.50 billion	$1.51	18.65

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

Summary

Halliburton beats Dawson Geophysical on 15 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Dawson Geophysical

Dawson Geophysical Company provides onshore seismic data acquisition and processing services in the United States and Canada. The company acquires and processes 2-D, 3-D, and multi-component seismic data for its clients, including oil and gas companies, and independent oil and gas operators, as well as providers of multi-client data libraries and carbon capture sequestration projects. Its seismic crews supply seismic data primarily to companies engaged in the exploration and development of oil and natural gas on land and in land-to-water transition areas, as well as potash mining industry. The company was founded in 1952 and is headquartered in Midland, Texas. Dawson Geophysical Company is a subsidiary of Wilks Brothers, LLC.

About Halliburton

Halliburton Company provides products and services to the energy industry worldwide. It operates through two segments, Completion and Production, and Drilling and Evaluation. The Completion and Production segment offers production enhancement services that include stimulation and sand control services; cementing services, such as well bonding and casing, and casing equipment; and completion tools that offer downhole solutions and services, including well completion products and services, intelligent well completions, and service tools, as well as liner hanger, sand control, and multilateral systems. This segment also provides electrical submersible pumps, as well as artificial lift services; production solutions comprising coiled tubing, hydraulic workover units, downhole tools, and pumping and nitrogen services; pipeline and process services, such as pre-commissioning, commissioning, maintenance, and decommissioning; and specialty chemicals and services. The Drilling and Evaluation segment offers drilling fluid systems, performance additives, completion fluids, solids control, specialized testing equipment, and waste management services; drilling systems and services; wireline and perforating services consists of open-hole logging, and cased-hole and slickline; and drill bits and services comprising roller cone rock bits, fixed cutter bits, hole enlargement, and related downhole tools and services, as well as coring equipment and services. This segment also provides cloud based digital services and artificial intelligence solutions on an open architecture for subsurface insights, integrated well construction, and reservoir and production management; testing and subsea services, such as acquisition and analysis of reservoir information and optimization solutions; and project management and integrated asset management services. Halliburton Company was founded in 1919 and is based in Houston, Texas.