Reviewing Safestore (OTCMKTS:SFSHF) and FRP (NASDAQ:FRPH)

FRP (NASDAQ:FRPH) and Safestore (OTCMKTS:SFSHF) are both finance companies, but which is the superior investment? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, earnings, risk, profitability, valuation, analyst recommendations and dividends.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

45.4% of FRP shares are held by institutional investors. 24.1% of FRP shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Risk and Volatility

FRP has a beta of 0.56, meaning that its stock price is 44% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Safestore has a beta of 0.79, meaning that its stock price is 21% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Profitability

This table compares FRP and Safestore’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
FRP	10.90%	1.00%	0.64%
Safestore	N/A	N/A	N/A

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of recent ratings for FRP and Safestore, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
FRP	1	0	0	0	1.00
Safestore	0	0	0	0	0.00

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares FRP and Safestore”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
FRP	$41.77 million	10.33	$6.39 million	$0.24	94.04
Safestore	$284.91 million	7.20	$474.94 million	N/A	N/A

Safestore has higher revenue and earnings than FRP.

Summary

FRP beats Safestore on 7 of the 10 factors compared between the two stocks.

About FRP

FRP Holdings, Inc. engages in the real estate business in the United States. It operates through four segments: Industrial and Commercial, Mining Royalty Lands, Development, and Multifamily. The Industrial and Commercial segment owns, leases, and manages commercial properties. The Mining Royalty Lands segment leases and manages mining royalties owned by the company primarily in Florida, Georgia, and Virginia. The Development segment owns and monitors the use of parcels of land that are in various stages of development; and acquires, constructs, and develops primarily for apartment, retail, warehouse, and office buildings. The Multifamily segment owns, leases, and manages buildings through joint ventures. The company was incorporated in 2014 and is based in Jacksonville, Florida.

About Safestore

Safestore is the UK’s largest self storage group with 190 stores on 31 October 2023, comprising 133 wholly owned stores in the UK (including 73 in London and the South East with the remainder in key metropolitan areas such as Manchester, Birmingham, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Liverpool, Sheffield, Leeds, Newcastle, and Bristol), 29 wholly owned stores in the Paris region, 11 stores in Spain, 11 stores in the Netherlands and 6 stores in Belgium. In addition, the Group operates 7 stores in Germany under a Joint Venture agreement with Carlyle. Safestore operates more self storage sites inside the M25 and in central Paris than any competitor providing more proximity to customers in the wealthiest and more densely populated UK and French markets. Safestore was founded in the UK in 1998. It acquired the French business “Une Pièce en Plus” (“UPP”) in 2004 which was founded in 1998 by the current Safestore Group CEO Frederic Vecchioli. Safestore has been listed on the London Stock Exchange since 2007. It entered the FTSE 250 index in October 2015. The Group provides storage to around 90,000 personal and business customers. As of 31 October 2023, Safestore had a maximum lettable area (“MLA”) of 8.090 million sq ft (excluding the expansion pipeline stores) of which 6.231 million sq ft was occupied. Safestore employs around 750 people in the UK, Paris, Spain, the Netherlands, and Belgium.