Head-To-Head Analysis: Future FinTech Group (NASDAQ:FTFT) vs. Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund (NYSE:MSDL)

Future FinTech Group (NASDAQ:FTFT) and Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund (NYSE:MSDL) are both small-cap finance companies, but which is the superior investment? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their valuation, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, profitability, earnings, dividends and risk.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

0.2% of Future FinTech Group shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.5% of Future FinTech Group shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.3% of Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Risk and Volatility

Future FinTech Group has a beta of 1.8, meaning that its stock price is 80% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund has a beta of 0.54, meaning that its stock price is 46% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of current ratings and price targets for Future FinTech Group and Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Future FinTech Group	1	0	0	0	1.00
Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund	0	6	1	0	2.14

Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund has a consensus price target of $15.50, indicating a potential upside of 5.98%. Given Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund is more favorable than Future FinTech Group.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Future FinTech Group and Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Future FinTech Group	$3.83 million	13.47	-$4.62 million	($30.16)	-0.18
Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund	$397.29 million	3.10	$122.09 million	$0.69	21.20

Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund has higher revenue and earnings than Future FinTech Group. Future FinTech Group is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Profitability

This table compares Future FinTech Group and Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Future FinTech Group	-157.53%	-12.22%	-10.08%
Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund	15.97%	9.61%	4.28%

Summary

Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund beats Future FinTech Group on 10 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Future FinTech Group

Future FinTech Group Inc., through its subsidiaries, operates online shopping platforms in People’s Republic of China. It operates in three segments: Supply Chain Financing Service and Trading Business, Asset Management Service, and Others. The company offers cross-border money transfer service, brokerage and investment banking, and cryptocurrency mining farm business. It also engages in the trading of coal, aluminum ingots, sand, and steel; and E-commerce, digital wallet safety management, blockchain code auditing and operations, cryptocurrency mining, metaverse and big data maintenance services. The company was formerly known as SkyPeople Fruit Juice, Inc. and changed its name to Future FinTech Group Inc. in June 2017. Future FinTech Group Inc. is headquartered in New York, New York.

About Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund

Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund is a business development company. It is a non-diversified, externally managed specialty finance company focused on lending to middle-market companies. Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund is based in NEW YORK.