Financial Survey: Postal Realty Trust (NYSE:PSTL) & Plymouth Industrial REIT (NYSE:PLYM)

Postal Realty Trust (NYSE:PSTL) and Plymouth Industrial REIT (NYSE:PLYM) are both small-cap finance companies, but which is the better business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their earnings, profitability, analyst recommendations, valuation, risk, dividends and institutional ownership.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of recent ratings and recommmendations for Postal Realty Trust and Plymouth Industrial REIT, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Postal Realty Trust	0	1	0	0	2.00
Plymouth Industrial REIT	1	1	4	0	2.50

Postal Realty Trust currently has a consensus target price of $16.50, indicating a potential upside of 15.30%. Plymouth Industrial REIT has a consensus target price of $25.00, indicating a potential upside of 11.11%. Given Postal Realty Trust’s higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Postal Realty Trust is more favorable than Plymouth Industrial REIT.

Profitability

This table compares Postal Realty Trust and Plymouth Industrial REIT’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Postal Realty Trust	5.82%	1.28%	0.69%
Plymouth Industrial REIT	6.75%	2.84%	0.91%

Volatility & Risk

Postal Realty Trust has a beta of 0.65, meaning that its share price is 35% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Plymouth Industrial REIT has a beta of 1.36, meaning that its share price is 36% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Dividends

Postal Realty Trust pays an annual dividend of $0.96 per share and has a dividend yield of 6.7%. Plymouth Industrial REIT pays an annual dividend of $0.90 per share and has a dividend yield of 4.0%. Postal Realty Trust pays out 872.8% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. Plymouth Industrial REIT pays out 473.7% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. Postal Realty Trust has increased its dividend for 5 consecutive years and Plymouth Industrial REIT has increased its dividend for 3 consecutive years. Postal Realty Trust is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and longer track record of dividend growth.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

57.9% of Postal Realty Trust shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 92.7% of Plymouth Industrial REIT shares are held by institutional investors. 13.6% of Postal Realty Trust shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 1.3% of Plymouth Industrial REIT shares are held by company 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 & Valuation

This table compares Postal Realty Trust and Plymouth Industrial REIT’s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Postal Realty Trust	$63.71 million	5.06	$3.71 million	$0.11	130.10
Plymouth Industrial REIT	$199.85 million	5.11	$13.66 million	$0.19	118.42

Plymouth Industrial REIT has higher revenue and earnings than Postal Realty Trust. Plymouth Industrial REIT is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Postal Realty Trust, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Summary

Plymouth Industrial REIT beats Postal Realty Trust on 12 of the 17 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Postal Realty Trust

Postal Realty Trust, Inc. (NYSE: PSTL) is an internally managed real estate investment trust that owns properties primarily leased to the United States Postal Service ("USPS"). PSTL is focused on acquiring the network of USPS properties, which provide a critical element of the nation's logistics infrastructure that facilitates cost effective and efficient last-mile delivery solutions. As of December 31, 2023, PSTL owned 1,509 properties (including two properties accounted for as financing leases) located in 49 states and one territory comprising approximately 5.9 million net leasable interior square feet. Subsequent to quarter-end and through February 23, 2024, PSTL closed on eight additional properties comprising approximately 33,000 net leasable interior square feet.

About Plymouth Industrial REIT

Plymouth Industrial REIT, Inc. (NYSE: PLYM) is a full service, vertically integrated real estate investment company focused on the acquisition, ownership and management of single and multi-tenant industrial properties. Our mission is to provide tenants with cost effective space that is functional, flexible and safe.