This is therefore a comparing of the dividends, analyst recommendations, profitability, risk, institutional ownership, earnings and valuation in Jefferies Financial Group Inc. (NYSE:JEF) and Rand Capital Corporation (NASDAQ:RAND). The two are both Asset Management companies that compete with one another.

Valuation & Earnings

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Jefferies Financial Group Inc.	5.22B	1.12	265.34M	1.26	15.92
Rand Capital Corporation	2.11M	9.15	N/A	-0.12	0.00

Table 1 highlights Jefferies Financial Group Inc. and Rand Capital Corporation’s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

Profitability

Table 2 provides the return on equity, return on assets and net margins of the two firms.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Jefferies Financial Group Inc.	5.08%	0%	0%
Rand Capital Corporation	0.00%	-3.5%	-2.8%

Dividends

Jefferies Financial Group Inc. dividend pay is $0.49 per share with 2.61% dividend yield annually. No dividend is paid out by Rand Capital Corporation

Institutional & Insider Ownership

The shares of both Jefferies Financial Group Inc. and Rand Capital Corporation are owned by institutional investors at 81.6% and 16.7% respectively. Insiders held roughly 7.9% of Jefferies Financial Group Inc.’s shares. Competitively, Rand Capital Corporation has 35.44% of it’s share held by insiders.

Performance

Here are the Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly, Half Yearly, Yearly and YTD Performance of both pretenders.

	Performance (W)	Performance (M)	Performance (Q)	Performance (HY)	Performance (Y)	Performance (YTD)
Jefferies Financial Group Inc.	-1.28%	-3.75%	-9%	-15.73%	-15.27%	15.38%
Rand Capital Corporation	-11.61%	-10.6%	3.85%	6.64%	-11.48%	8%

For the past year Jefferies Financial Group Inc. has stronger performance than Rand Capital Corporation

Summary

On 9 of the 10 factors Jefferies Financial Group Inc. beats Rand Capital Corporation.

Jefferies Financial Group Inc., a financial services company, offers a range of products and services in investment banking, equities, fixed income, and wealth management in the Americas, Europe, and Asia. It engages in the debt capital market, equity capital market, merger and acquisition, private capital advisory, and restructuring and recapitalization businesses. The company also offers cash equities; electronic trading solutions, such as global algorithmic and portfolio trading solutions; equity derivatives, such as U.S. equity options, U.S. exchange-traded funds, and Europe equity derivatives, as well as trades in a range of convertible securities from large investment-grade issues to small private transactions; access to investors and logistics; and prime services. In addition, it provides fixed income products, such as government securities, mortgage and asset backed securities, corporate credits, sovereign and corporate fixed income securities, municipal securities, debt solutions, and foreign exchange. Further, the company offers asset management services; and wealth management services, such as investment advisory, financial planning, family office and institutional consulting, executive, and lending solutions. The company was formerly known as Leucadia National Corporation and changed its name to Jefferies Financial Group Inc. in May 2018. Jefferies Financial Group Inc. was founded in 1968 and is based in New York, New York.

Rand Capital Corporation is a business development company specializing in venture capital and private equity investments. The firm prefers to make investments through equity or debt instruments in early venture, expansion stage, and in small to medium-sized privately held companies. It generally lends to more mature companies. The firm does not prefer to invest in real estate sector. It invests in companies that are engaged in the exploitation of new or unique products, technologies, or services. The firm invests in healthcare, consumer products, manufacturing, software, and professional services. It seeks to invest in companies based in the Western and Upstate New York region and its surrounding states with focus on Buffalo and Niagara region. The firm may invest in region within three to five hour drives from Western New York including Canada. It typically invests between $0.5 million and $1.5 million and the total investment in rounds is between $1 million and $5 million. The firm seeks to invest up to maximum of $3 million total per company as part of follow-on investments. It invest in startups and companies having annual revenue up to $10 million. The firm seeks to be a lead investor in companies within its geographical area and participates in syndicate/co-invest with other investors outside it. It prefers to invest in businesses that are unique or possess proprietary right. The firm prefers to be a minority investor and seeks to take a Board seat in its portfolio companies. It typically holds its investments for a period of five to seven years. Rand Capital Corporation was founded in 1969 and is based in Buffalo, New York.