Contrasting Geo Group (NYSE:GEO) & ICF International (NASDAQ:ICFI)

Geo Group (NYSE:GEO) and ICF International (NASDAQ:ICFI) are both business services companies, but which is the superior investment? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their earnings, institutional ownership, profitability, valuation, risk, dividends and analyst recommendations.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of current recommendations for Geo Group and ICF International, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Geo Group	0	0	4	0	3.00
ICF International	0	2	3	0	2.60

Geo Group presently has a consensus price target of $38.00, indicating a potential upside of 46.04%. ICF International has a consensus price target of $127.20, indicating a potential upside of 43.66%. Given Geo Group’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, equities research analysts clearly believe Geo Group is more favorable than ICF International.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Geo Group and ICF International”s revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Geo Group	$2.42 billion	1.52	$31.97 million	$0.19	136.95
ICF International	$2.02 billion	0.81	$110.17 million	$5.83	15.19

ICF International has lower revenue, but higher earnings than Geo Group. ICF International is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Geo Group, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Insider & Institutional Ownership

76.1% of Geo Group shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 94.1% of ICF International shares are owned by institutional investors. 5.3% of Geo Group shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 1.5% of ICF International shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, endowments and hedge funds believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Profitability

This table compares Geo Group and ICF International’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Geo Group	1.19%	7.36%	2.67%
ICF International	5.45%	14.84%	7.02%

Risk and Volatility

Geo Group has a beta of 0.71, indicating that its share price is 29% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, ICF International has a beta of 0.5, indicating that its share price is 50% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Summary

Geo Group beats ICF International on 8 of the 14 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Geo Group

The GEO Group, Inc. (NYSE: GEO) engages in ownership, leasing, and management of secure facilities, processing centers, and community-based reentry facilities in the United States, Australia, the United Kingdom, and South Africa. The company also provides secure facility management services, including the provision of security, administrative, rehabilitation, education, and food services; reentry services, such as temporary housing, programming, employment assistance, and other services; electronic monitoring and supervision services; and transportation services; as well as designs, constructs, and finances new facilities through projects. The company was founded in 1984 and is based in Boca Raton, Florida.

About ICF International

ICF International, Inc. provides management, technology, and policy consulting and implementation services to government and commercial clients in the United States and internationally. The company researches critical policy, industry, stakeholder issues, trends, and behaviors; measures and evaluates results and their impact; and provides strategic planning and advisory services to its clients on how to navigate societal, business, market, business, communication, and technology challenges. It also identifies, defines, and implements policies, plans, programs, and business tools through a range of standard and customized methodologies for its clients' business context; conducts survey research; collects and analyzes various data to understand critical issues and options for its clients; and provides actionable business intelligence, as well as information and data management solutions that allow integrated and purpose-driven data usage. In addition, the company provides solutions to optimize the customer and citizen experience; modernizes IT systems; and cyber security solutions that support the range of cyber security missions and protect IT infrastructures in the face of relentless threats, as well as designs, develops, and implements technology systems and business tools that are key to its clients' mission or business performance. Further, it informs and engages its clients' constituents, customers, and employees through public relations, branding and marketing, multichannel and strategic communications, and reputation issues management. The company serves energy, environment, infrastructure, and disaster recovery; health and social programs; and security and other civilian and commercial markets. The company was formerly known as ICF Consulting Group Holdings, LLC and changed its name to ICF International, Inc. in 2006. ICF International, Inc. was founded in 1969 and is headquartered in Reston, Virginia.