Analyzing Iron Mountain (NYSE:IRM) & Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple (NYSE:GRP.U)

Iron Mountain (NYSE:IRM) and Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple (NYSE:GRP.U) are both business services companies, but which is the better business? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their dividends, earnings, profitability, valuation, analyst recommendations, institutional ownership and risk.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a summary of recent ratings and recommmendations for Iron Mountain and Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Iron Mountain	0	0	6	1	3.14
Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple	0	0	0	0	0.00

Iron Mountain currently has a consensus target price of $131.00, suggesting a potential upside of 29.43%. Given Iron Mountain’s stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities research analysts plainly believe Iron Mountain is more favorable than Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple.

Dividends

Iron Mountain pays an annual dividend of $2.86 per share and has a dividend yield of 2.8%. Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple pays an annual dividend of $1.77 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.7%. Iron Mountain pays out 794.4% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple pays out 49.4% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple is clearly the better dividend stock, given its higher yield and lower payout ratio.

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Iron Mountain and Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple”s gross revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Iron Mountain	$5.99 billion	4.96	$184.23 million	$0.36	281.14
Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple	$550.94 million	5.38	$101.24 million	$3.58	13.20

Iron Mountain has higher revenue and earnings than Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple. Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Iron Mountain, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Profitability

This table compares Iron Mountain and Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Iron Mountain	1.77%	-44,660.04%	2.94%
Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple	55.97%	5.71%	3.34%

Institutional and Insider Ownership

80.1% of Iron Mountain shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 57.1% of Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple shares are owned by institutional investors. 2.1% of Iron Mountain shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.3% of Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that large money managers, hedge funds and endowments believe a company is poised for long-term growth.

Summary

Iron Mountain beats Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple on 9 of the 16 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Iron Mountain

Iron Mountain Incorporated (NYSE: IRM) is a global leader in information management services. Founded in 1951 and trusted by more than 240,000 customers worldwide, Iron Mountain serves to protect and elevate the power of our customers’ work. Through a range of offerings including digital transformation, data centers, secure records storage, information management, asset lifecycle management, secure destruction and art storage and logistics, Iron Mountain helps businesses bring light to their dark data, enabling customers to unlock value and intelligence from their stored digital and physical assets at speed and with security, while helping them meet their environmental goals.

About Granite Real Estate Inc. Staple

Granite Real Estate Investment Trust is engaged in the ownership and management of predominantly industrial properties in Canada, the United States, Mexico and Europe. The Company owns and manages rental income properties. Its services include sourcing and real estate acquisition, site development, assisting with government approvals and re-zoning to specific uses, build-to-suit construction, property renovation, project management and long-term leasing. Granite Real Estate Investment Trust, formerly known as Granite Real Estate Inc., is based in Toronto, Canada.