Reviewing Lineage (NASDAQ:LINE) & LXP Industrial Trust (NYSE:LXP)

LXP Industrial Trust (NYSE:LXP) and Lineage (NASDAQ:LINE) are both mid-cap real estate companies, but which is the superior business? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, profitability, dividends, valuation, analyst recommendations, risk and earnings.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

93.5% of LXP Industrial Trust shares are held by institutional investors. 2.8% of LXP Industrial Trust shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 71.6% of Lineage shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock is poised for long-term growth.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent recommendations and price targets for LXP Industrial Trust and Lineage, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
LXP Industrial Trust	0	7	2	0	2.22
Lineage	3	9	5	0	2.12

LXP Industrial Trust presently has a consensus price target of $57.40, suggesting a potential downside of 5.63%. Lineage has a consensus price target of $44.20, suggesting a potential upside of 17.09%. Given Lineage’s higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Lineage is more favorable than LXP Industrial Trust.

Profitability

This table compares LXP Industrial Trust and Lineage’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
LXP Industrial Trust	18.66%	3.37%	1.83%
Lineage	-3.15%	-1.85%	-0.89%

Risk and Volatility

LXP Industrial Trust has a beta of 1.02, suggesting that its share price is 2% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Lineage has a beta of 0.82, suggesting that its share price is 18% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Dividends

LXP Industrial Trust pays an annual dividend of $2.80 per share and has a dividend yield of 4.6%. Lineage pays an annual dividend of $2.13 per share and has a dividend yield of 5.6%. LXP Industrial Trust pays out 280.0% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. Lineage pays out -295.8% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. LXP Industrial Trust has increased its dividend for 3 consecutive years. Lineage is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares LXP Industrial Trust and Lineage”s revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
LXP Industrial Trust	$350.23 million	10.24	$113.16 million	$1.00	60.82
Lineage	$5.37 billion	1.60	-$100.00 million	($0.72)	-52.43

LXP Industrial Trust has higher earnings, but lower revenue than Lineage. Lineage is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than LXP Industrial Trust, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Summary

LXP Industrial Trust beats Lineage on 11 of the 17 factors compared between the two stocks.

About LXP Industrial Trust

LXP Industrial Trust (NYSE: LXP) is a publicly traded real estate investment trust (REIT) focused on single-tenant industrial real estate investments across the United States. LXP seeks to expand its industrial portfolio through acquisitions, build-to-suit transactions, sale-leaseback transactions, development projects and other transactions.

About Lineage

Lineage, Inc. is the world’s largest global temperature-controlled warehouse REIT with a network of over 480 strategically located facilities totaling over 84.1 million square feet and 3.0 billion cubic feet of capacity across countries in North America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific. Coupling end-to-end supply chain solutions and technology, Lineage partners with some of the world’s largest food and beverage producers, retailers, and distributors to help increase distribution efficiency, advance sustainability, minimize supply chain waste, and, most importantly, feed the world.