ACI Worldwide (NASDAQ:ACIW – Get Free Report) and Rekor Systems (NASDAQ:REKR – Get Free Report) are both technology companies, but which is the superior business? We will contrast the two businesses based on the strength of their earnings, profitability, institutional ownership, valuation, dividends, analyst recommendations and risk.
Institutional and Insider Ownership
94.7% of ACI Worldwide shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 45.7% of Rekor Systems shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.2% of ACI Worldwide shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 3.2% of Rekor Systems 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.
Profitability
This table compares ACI Worldwide and Rekor Systems’ net margins, return on equity and return on assets.
| Net Margins | Return on Equity | Return on Assets | |
| ACI Worldwide | 12.40% | 17.62% | 8.47% |
| Rekor Systems | -43.84% | -59.05% | -27.37% |
Earnings and Valuation
| Gross Revenue | Price/Sales Ratio | Net Income | Earnings Per Share | Price/Earnings Ratio | |
| ACI Worldwide | $1.76 billion | 2.84 | $226.66 million | $2.18 | 22.72 |
| Rekor Systems | $48.45 million | 1.22 | -$31.46 million | ($0.16) | -2.67 |
ACI Worldwide has higher revenue and earnings than Rekor Systems. Rekor Systems is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than ACI Worldwide, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.
Analyst Recommendations
This is a breakdown of recent ratings for ACI Worldwide and Rekor Systems, as reported by MarketBeat.com.
| Sell Ratings | Hold Ratings | Buy Ratings | Strong Buy Ratings | Rating Score | |
| ACI Worldwide | 0 | 0 | 2 | 1 | 3.33 |
| Rekor Systems | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1.00 |
ACI Worldwide currently has a consensus target price of $66.00, indicating a potential upside of 33.28%. Given ACI Worldwide’s stronger consensus rating and higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe ACI Worldwide is more favorable than Rekor Systems.
Risk & Volatility
ACI Worldwide has a beta of 0.98, suggesting that its share price is 2% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Rekor Systems has a beta of 1.79, suggesting that its share price is 79% more volatile than the S&P 500.
Summary
ACI Worldwide beats Rekor Systems on 13 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.
About ACI Worldwide
ACI Worldwide, Inc., a software company, develops, markets, installs, and supports a range of software products and solutions for facilitating digital payments in the United States and internationally. The company operates in three segments: Banks, Merchants, and Billers. The company offers ACI Acquiring, a solution to process credit, debit, and prepaid card transactions, deliver digital innovation, and fraud prevention; ACI Issuing, a digital payment issuing solution for new payment offering; and ACI Enterprise Payments Platform that provides payment processing and orchestration capabilities for digital payments. It also provides ACI Low Value Real-Time Payments, a platform for processing real-time payments; and ACI High Value Real-Time Payments, a payments engine that offers multi-bank, multi-currency, 24×7 payment processing, and SWIFT messaging. In addition, the company offers ACI Payments Orchestration Platform for optimizing payments; omni-channel payment platform; ACI Fraud Management, a real-time approach to fraud management; and ACI Speedpay, an integrated suite of digital billing, payment, disbursement, and communication services. The company offers electronic bill presentment and payment services to consumer finance, insurance, healthcare, higher education, utility, government, telecommunications, and mortgage sectors; implementation services, include product installations and configurations, and custom software modifications; and business and technical consultancy, on-site support, product education, and testing services, as well as distributes or acts as a sales agent for software developed by third parties. It markets its products under the ACI Worldwide brand. The company was formerly known as Transaction Systems Architects, Inc. and changed its name to ACI Worldwide, Inc. in July 2007. The company was founded in 1975 and is based in Elkhorn, Nebraska.
About Rekor Systems
Rekor Systems, Inc., a technology company, provides infrastructure solutions for transportation, public safety, and urban mobility markets in the United States and internationally. The company's platforms include Rekor One, an AI-powered roadway intelligence platform; Rekor Command, a comprehensive cross-agency platform that offers various applications for traffic management centers, freeway service patrol, first responders, and maintenance crews; Rekor Discover, a platform that ingests data from its hardware and automates comprehensive analytics and actionable insights about the movement of objects across the roadway; and Rekor Scout platform, which automates previously manual processes with collaborative solutions that keep all stakeholders apprised of developing situations and accelerate reaction times to incidents and offenders. It also offers Rekor AutoNotice, a cloud-based financial management application that delivers a turnkey information and citation management solution for cities, states, and municipalities for primary and secondary offenses; and Rekor CarCheck, which allows its AI based vehicle and license plate recognition technology to be accessed for a range of commercial applications. In addition, the company offers Rekor Edge Max System, a fixed traffic data collection system that captures and transforms roadway data into holistic traffic insights; Rekor Edge Pro, a vehicle recognition solution that is used on a standalone basis or integrated into a network; and Rekor Edge Flex, a portable data collection system. Further, it provides traffic services, including traditional traffic studies, which delivers data and insights for planning and management of roadway infrastructure and commercial initiatives; innovative AI-driven traffic studies for traffic management; and traffic engineering services. The company was incorporated in 2017 and is headquartered in Columbia, Maryland.
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