Reviewing Assured Guaranty (NYSE:AGO) & Amacore Group (OTCMKTS:ACGI)

Amacore Group (OTCMKTS:ACGI) and Assured Guaranty (NYSE:AGO) are both finance companies, but which is the superior investment? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their risk, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, earnings, profitability, dividends and valuation.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

92.2% of Assured Guaranty shares are held by institutional investors. 5.1% of Assured Guaranty shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Volatility & Risk

Amacore Group has a beta of 3.35, suggesting that its share price is 235% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Assured Guaranty has a beta of 0.91, suggesting that its share price is 9% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current ratings and recommmendations for Amacore Group and Assured Guaranty, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Amacore Group	0	0	0	0	0.00
Assured Guaranty	0	2	2	0	2.50

Assured Guaranty has a consensus price target of $101.00, suggesting a potential upside of 13.66%. Given Assured Guaranty’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Assured Guaranty is more favorable than Amacore Group.

Profitability

This table compares Amacore Group and Assured Guaranty’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Amacore Group	N/A	N/A	N/A
Assured Guaranty	40.65%	7.09%	3.35%

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Amacore Group and Assured Guaranty”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Amacore Group	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A
Assured Guaranty	$872.00 million	4.70	$376.00 million	$8.06	11.02

Assured Guaranty has higher revenue and earnings than Amacore Group.

Summary

Assured Guaranty beats Amacore Group on 9 of the 10 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Amacore Group

The Amacore Group, Inc. provides and markets healthcare-related membership products for individuals and families. Its products include limited and major medical insurance programs, supplemental medical insurance, and discount dental and vision programs. The company also provides and markets lifestyle membership programs, including insurance discounts, discount benefit savings, ID theft, legal counsel, credit management, automotive warranties, employment protection, and a host of others. The company serves insurance carriers, financial institutions, affiliate marketers, direct marketers, insurance agents, and fortune 500 companies. It distributes its products and services through various distribution methods, such as its agent network, inbound call center, in-house sales representatives, network marketing, and affinity marketing partners, as well as through third-party direct response marketers. The Amacore Group, Inc. was formerly known as Eye Care International Inc. and changed its name to The Amacore Group, Inc. in April 2005. The company was founded in 1993 and is based in Maitland, Florida.

About Assured Guaranty

Assured Guaranty Ltd., together with its subsidiaries, provides credit protection products to public finance, infrastructure, and structured finance markets in the United States and internationally. It operates through two segments: Insurance and Asset Management. The company offers financial guaranty insurance that protects holders of debt instruments and other monetary obligations from defaults in scheduled payments. It insures and reinsures various debt obligations, including bonds issued by the United States state governmental authorities; and notes issued to finance infrastructure projects. In addition, the company insures and reinsures various the U.S. public finance obligations, such as general obligation, tax-backed, municipal utility, transportation, healthcare, higher education, infrastructure, housing revenue, investor-owned utility, renewable energy, and other public finance bonds. Further, the company involved in insuring and reinsuring of non-U.S. public finance obligations comprising regulated utilities, infrastructure finance, sovereign and sub-sovereign, renewable energy bonds, pooled infrastructure, and other public finance obligations; and the U.S. and non-U.S. Structured finance obligations, including residential mortgage-backed securities, life insurance transactions, consumer receivables securities, subscription finance facilities, pooled corporate obligations, and financial products. Additionally, it offers specialty business, such as real estate properties, insurance securitizations, and aircraft residual value insurance (RVI) transactions; and asset management services comprising investment advisory services. It markets its financial guaranty insurance directly to issuers and underwriters of public finance and structured finance securities, as well as to investors in such obligations. Assured Guaranty Ltd. was incorporated in 2003 and is headquartered in Hamilton, Bermuda.