TKO Group (NYSE:TKO) and Cedar Fair (NYSE:FUN) Financial Review

Cedar Fair (NYSE:FUN) and TKO Group (NYSE:TKO) are both consumer discretionary companies, but which is the superior business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their institutional ownership, analyst recommendations, valuation, dividends, risk, profitability and earnings.

Dividends

Cedar Fair pays an annual dividend of $1.20 per share and has a dividend yield of 3.0%. TKO Group pays an annual dividend of $0.12 per share and has a dividend yield of 0.1%. Cedar Fair pays out 49.4% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. TKO Group pays out -11.9% 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.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

64.7% of Cedar Fair shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 89.8% of TKO Group shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.8% of Cedar Fair shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 53.8% of TKO Group shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a company will outperform the market over the long term.

Analyst Ratings

This is a summary of current ratings and price targets for Cedar Fair and TKO Group, as provided by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Cedar Fair	1	1	9	0	2.73
TKO Group	0	2	12	0	2.86

Cedar Fair presently has a consensus price target of $58.82, indicating a potential upside of 46.20%. TKO Group has a consensus price target of $124.07, indicating a potential upside of 7.92%. Given Cedar Fair’s higher probable upside, equities research analysts clearly believe Cedar Fair is more favorable than TKO Group.

Profitability

This table compares Cedar Fair and TKO Group’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Cedar Fair	6.80%	-23.97%	6.70%
TKO Group	-3.14%	3.10%	2.13%

Volatility and Risk

Cedar Fair has a beta of 1.56, suggesting that its stock price is 56% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, TKO Group has a beta of 1.04, suggesting that its stock price is 4% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Earnings and Valuation

This table compares Cedar Fair and TKO Group”s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Cedar Fair	$1.82 billion	1.14	$124.56 million	$2.43	16.56
TKO Group	$2.54 billion	7.70	$208.18 million	($1.01)	-113.83

TKO Group has higher revenue and earnings than Cedar Fair. TKO Group is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Cedar Fair, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Summary

TKO Group beats Cedar Fair on 9 of the 16 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Cedar Fair

Cedar Fair, L.P. owns and operates amusement and water parks, as well as complementary resort facilities. Its amusement parks include Cedar Point located on Lake Erie between Cleveland and Toledo in Sandusky, Ohio; Knott's Berry Farm near Los Angeles, California; Canada's Wonderland near Toronto, Ontario; Kings Island near Cincinnati, Ohio; Carowinds in Charlotte, North Carolina; Kings Dominion situated near Richmond, Virginia; California's Great America located in Santa Clara, California; Dorney Park in Pennsylvania; Worlds of Fun located in Kansas City, Missouri; Valleyfair situated near Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota; Michigan's Adventure situated near Muskegon, Michigan; Schlitterbahn Waterpark & Resort New Braunfels in New Braunfels, Texas; and Schlitterbahn Waterpark Galveston in Galveston, Texas. The company also owns and operates the Castaway Bay Indoor Waterpark Resort, Hotel Breakers, Cedar Point's Express Hotel, and Sawmill Creek Resort. Cedar Fair, L.P. was founded in 1983 and is based in Sandusky, Ohio.

About TKO Group

TKO Group Holdings, Inc. operates as a sports and entertainment company. The company produces and licenses live events, television programs, and long-form and short-form content, reality series, and other filmed entertainment on digital and linear channels and via pay-per-view. It is involved in the merchandising of video games, apparel, equipment, trading cards, memorabilia, digital goods, and toys, as well as sale of travel packages and tickets. In addition, the company engages in the corporate sponsorships and advertising business, which offers sale of in-venue and in-broadcast advertising assets, content product integration, and digital impressions. The company was incorporated in 2023 and is based in New York, New York. TKO Group Holdings, Inc. is a subsidiary of Endeavor Group Holdings, Inc.