Reviewing Knife River (NYSE:KNF) and Boral (OTCMKTS:BOALY)

Boral (OTCMKTS:BOALY) and Knife River (NYSE:KNF) are both materials companies, but which is the superior investment? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, risk, institutional ownership, profitability, earnings, dividends and valuation.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of recent recommendations for Boral and Knife River, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Boral	0	0	0	0	0.00
Knife River	0	4	6	0	2.60

Knife River has a consensus target price of $91.86, suggesting a potential upside of 36.09%. Given Knife River’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe Knife River is more favorable than Boral.

Institutional and Insider Ownership

0.0% of Boral shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 80.1% of Knife River shares are owned by institutional investors. 0.4% of Knife River shares are owned by 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.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Boral and Knife River”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Boral	N/A	N/A	N/A	$0.88	15.92
Knife River	$3.15 billion	1.22	$157.07 million	$2.57	26.26

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

Profitability

This table compares Boral and Knife River’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Boral	N/A	N/A	N/A
Knife River	4.23%	8.73%	3.65%

Summary

Knife River beats Boral on 11 of the 11 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Boral

Boral Limited operates as a vertically integrated construction materials company in Australia. The company operates through Construction Materials and Property segments. It engages in cement infrastructure, bitumen, construction materials recycling, asphalt, and concrete batching operations. The company also offers construction materials concrete, asphalt, quarries, cement, recycling, and concrete placing services. In addition, it provides circular material solutions, architects training, innovation factory, and material technical services, as well as offers property development and divestment activities. The company was incorporated in 1946 and is headquartered in North Ryde, Australia. Boral Limited is a subsidiary of Network Investment Holdings Pty Limited.

About Knife River

Knife River Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides aggregates- led construction materials and contracting services in the United States. It operates through Pacific, Northwest, Mountain, Central, and Energy Services segments. The company mines, processes, and sells construction aggregates, including crushed stone and sand, and gravel; and produces and sells asphalt and ready-mix concrete. It also provides contracting service, such as heavy-civil construction, asphalt and concrete paving, and site development and grading. In addition, the company sells cement, merchandise, and other building materials and related services. The company sells its construction materials to public and private-sector customers, including federal, state, and municipal governments, as well as industrial, commercial and residential developers, and other private parties; and provides its contracting services to public-sector customers for the development and servicing of highways, local roads, bridges, and other public-infrastructure projects. Knife River Corporation was founded in 1917 and is based in Bismarck, North Dakota.