Contrasting Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund (NYSE:MSDL) & Main Street Capital (NYSE:MAIN)

Main Street Capital (NYSE:MAIN – Get Free Report) and Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund (NYSE:MSDL – Get Free Report) are both finance companies, but which is the superior stock? We will contrast the two companies based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, risk, dividends, profitability, valuation, earnings and institutional ownership.

Insider and Institutional Ownership

20.3% of Main Street Capital shares are held by institutional investors. 3.8% of Main Street Capital shares are held by company insiders. Comparatively, 0.3% of Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund shares are held by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that hedge funds, endowments and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Profitability

This table compares Main Street Capital and Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

Analyst Ratings

This is a breakdown of current recommendations for Main Street Capital and Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund, as reported by MarketBeat.com.

Main Street Capital currently has a consensus target price of $61.67, indicating a potential upside of 10.87%. Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund has a consensus target price of $15.50, indicating a potential upside of 13.11%. Given Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund’s higher probable upside, analysts clearly believe Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund is more favorable than Main Street Capital.

Risk and Volatility

Main Street Capital has a beta of 0.74, meaning that its stock price is 26% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund has a beta of 0.58, meaning that its stock price is 42% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Dividends

Main Street Capital pays an annual dividend of $3.18 per share and has a dividend yield of 5.7%. Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund pays an annual dividend of $1.80 per share and has a dividend yield of 13.1%. Main Street Capital pays out 64.1% of its earnings in the form of a dividend. Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund pays out 260.9% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future. Main Street Capital has increased its dividend for 4 consecutive years.

Valuation and Earnings

This table compares Main Street Capital and Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund”s top-line revenue, earnings per share (EPS) and valuation.

Main Street Capital has higher revenue and earnings than Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund. Main Street Capital is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Summary

Main Street Capital beats Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund on 14 of the 17 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Main Street Capital

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Main Street Capital Corporation is a business development company specializes in equity capital to lower middle market companies. The firm specializing in recapitalizations, management buyouts, refinancing, family estate planning, management buyouts, refinancing, industry consolidation, mature, later stage emerging growth. The firm also provides debt capital to middle market companies for acquisitions, management buyouts, growth financings, recapitalizations, and refinancing. The firm seeks to partner with entrepreneurs, business owners and management teams and generally provides “one stop” financing alternatives within its lower middle market portfolio. It prefers to invest in air freight and logistics, auto components, building products, chemicals, commercial services, computers, construction and engineering, consumer finance, consumer services, electronic equipment, energy equipment and services, financial services, health care equipment, health care providers, hotels, restaurants, and leisure, internet software and services, IT Services, machinery, oil, gas and consumable fuels, paper and forest products, professional and industrial services, road and rail, software, specialty retail, telecommunication, consumer discretionary, energy, materials, technology, and transportation. The firm typically invests in lower middle market companies generally with annual revenues between $10 million and $150 million. It prefers to invest in ranging between $5 million and $100 million in equity investment and enterprise value in ranging between $3 million and $20 million. The firm typically prefers to invest in the range of $5 million and $150 million per transaction in debt investment value and in the range of $3 million and $75 million in annual EBITDA in between $3 million and $25 million in lower middle market $5 million and $75 million in credit solution. The firm’s middle market debt investments are made in businesses that are generally larger in size than its lower middle market portfolio companies. It takes 5 percent minority and up to 50 percent majority equity investments. Main Street Capital Corporation was founded in 2007 and is based in Houston, Texas with an additional office in Chojnów, Poland.

About Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund

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Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund is a business development company. It is a non-diversified, externally managed specialty finance company focused on lending to middle-market companies. Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund is based in NEW YORK.