Financial Contrast: Vast Renewables (NASDAQ:VSTE) and Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises (NYSE:BW)

Vast Renewables (NASDAQ:VSTE) and Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises (NYSE:BW) are both small-cap oils/energy companies, but which is the superior stock? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their valuation, institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, profitability, dividends, risk and earnings.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

90.9% of Vast Renewables shares are held by institutional investors. Comparatively, 83.2% of Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises shares are held by institutional investors. 41.2% of Vast Renewables shares are held by insiders. Comparatively, 4.3% of Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises shares are held by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, large money managers and endowments believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Profitability

This table compares Vast Renewables and Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Vast Renewables	N/A	N/A	N/A
Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises	-18.85%	N/A	-5.77%

Volatility and Risk

Vast Renewables has a beta of -0.4, indicating that its share price is 140% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises has a beta of 1.74, indicating that its share price is 74% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current ratings and price targets for Vast Renewables and Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Vast Renewables	0	0	0	0	N/A
Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises	0	1	2	0	2.67

Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises has a consensus target price of $4.50, suggesting a potential upside of 89.08%. Given Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises’ higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises is more favorable than Vast Renewables.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Vast Renewables and Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Vast Renewables	$342,000.00	46.59	-$293.45 million	N/A	N/A
Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises	$907.78 million	0.24	-$197.21 million	($2.42)	-0.98

Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises has higher revenue and earnings than Vast Renewables.

About Vast Renewables

Nabors Energy Transition Corp. is a blank check company. It intends to effect a merger, capital stock exchange, asset acquisition, stock purchase, reorganization or related business combination with one or more businesses. Nabors Energy Transition Corp. is based in Houston, Texas.

About Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises

Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, provides energy and emissions control solutions to industrial, electrical utility, municipal, and other customers worldwide. The company operates through three segments: Babcock & Wilcox Renewable; Babcock & Wilcox Environmental; and Babcock & Wilcox Thermal. The Babcock & Wilcox Renewable segment offers technologies divert the waste from landfills for power generation and replacing fossil fuels and recovering metals and reducing emissions. It offers BrightLoop, a hydrogen generation technology that generates hydrogen from a range of fuels, including solid fuels, such as biomass and coal. This segment also provides technologies for power and heat generation comprising waste-to-energy; OxyBright, an oxygen-fired biomass-to-energy technology; and black liquor systems for the pulp and paper industry. The Babcock & Wilcox Environmental segment offers a range of emissions control and environmental technology solutions for utility, waste to energy, biomass, carbon black, and industrial steam generation applications. This segment provides systems for cooling, ash handling, particulate control, nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxides removal, chemical looping for carbon control, and mercury control under the SolveBright, OxyBright, BrightLoop, and BrightGen names. The Babcock & Wilcox Thermal segment offers aftermarket parts, construction, maintenance, engineered upgrades, and field services for its installed bases, as well as the installed base of other OEMs for power generation, oil and gas, petrochemical, food and beverage, metals and mining, and others. This segment also provides steam generation systems, including package boilers, watertube and firetube waste heat boilers, and other boilers to medium and heavy industrial customers. Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises, Inc. was founded in 1867 and is based in Akron, Ohio.