Reviewing bpost NV/SA (OTCMKTS:BPOSY) and Japan Tobacco (OTCMKTS:JAPAY)

Japan Tobacco (OTCMKTS:JAPAY) and bpost NV/SA (OTCMKTS:BPOSY) are both consumer staples companies, but which is the superior stock? We will compare the two companies based on the strength of their valuation, earnings, risk, dividends, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations and profitability.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current ratings and recommmendations for Japan Tobacco and bpost NV/SA, as provided by MarketBeat.com.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Japan Tobacco	0	0	0	1	4.00
bpost NV/SA	0	0	0	0	0.00

Dividends

Japan Tobacco pays an annual dividend of $0.38 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.7%. bpost NV/SA pays an annual dividend of $0.07 per share and has a dividend yield of 4.5%. Japan Tobacco pays out 43.7% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. bpost NV/SA pays out -6.4% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Both companies have healthy payout ratios and should be able to cover their dividend payments with earnings for the next several years. bpost NV/SA is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Japan Tobacco and bpost NV/SA”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Japan Tobacco	$20.83 billion	2.43	$3.06 billion	$0.87	16.38
bpost NV/SA	$4.61 billion	0.07	$71.21 million	($1.10)	-1.41

Japan Tobacco has higher revenue and earnings than bpost NV/SA. bpost NV/SA is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Japan Tobacco, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Profitability

This table compares Japan Tobacco and bpost NV/SA’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Japan Tobacco	14.74%	11.11%	6.35%
bpost NV/SA	1.96%	9.66%	2.37%

Volatility & Risk

Japan Tobacco has a beta of 0.36, indicating that its stock price is 64% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, bpost NV/SA has a beta of 0.53, indicating that its stock price is 47% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Japan Tobacco beats bpost NV/SA on 10 of the 13 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Japan Tobacco

Japan Tobacco Inc., a tobacco company, manufactures and sells tobacco products, pharmaceuticals, and processed foods in Japan and internationally. The company operates through three segments: Tobacco Business, Pharmaceutical, and Processed Food. It offers tobacco products, such as cigarettes, heat-not-burn tobacco products, E-vapor products, fine cut tobacco products, cigars, pipes, smokeless tobacco products, and hookah and kretek products. The company also provides reduced-risk products, including infused tobacco capsules and heated tobacco sticks. In addition, it researches and develops, manufactures, and sells prescription drugs for the therapeutic areas, such as cardiovascular, kidney and metabolism, immunity/inflammation, and central nervous system. Further, the company provides frozen and room-temperature products, such as frozen udon noodles, packed rice, and frozen okonomiyaki; bakery products; and seasonings, including yeast extracts, assembled, kelp and bonito extracts, and oyster sauces. It offers its products under the Winston, Camel, MEVIUS, and LD brands. Japan Tobacco Inc. was incorporated in 1985 and is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan.

About bpost NV/SA

bpost NV/SA, together with its subsidiaries, provides mail and parcel services to individuals, businesses, and public institutions in Belgium, rest of Europe, the United States, and internationally. It operates through Belgium, E-Logistics Eurasia, and E-Logistics North America segments. The company offers collection, transport, sorting, and distribution of addressed and non-addressed mail, printed documents, newspapers, periodicals, and parcels, as well as banking and financial products, e-commerce logistics, express delivery, and related services. It also provides transactional mails, advertising mails, press, domestic and international parcels, and logistic solutions; e-commerce fulfilment, including warehousing and handling of goods; e-commerce cross-border services, including custom duties services; operational back-office services, including call center, payment and financial, fraud and tax, administrative and document management services; and proximity and convenience services, such as the access to the network and over-the-counter service for different partners and sale of self-produced goods, as well as retail products and goods of partners, including bpost bank products; repair of electronics; and import services. The company was founded in 1830 and is headquartered in Brussels, Belgium.