WhiteHorse Finance (NASDAQ:WHF) vs. Nuveen Municipal Income Fund (NYSE:NMI) Head to Head Survey

Nuveen Municipal Income Fund (NYSE:NMI) and WhiteHorse Finance (NASDAQ:WHF) are both small-cap finance companies, but which is the better investment? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their earnings, dividends, valuation, profitability, institutional ownership, risk and analyst recommendations.

Risk & Volatility

Nuveen Municipal Income Fund has a beta of 0.24, indicating that its share price is 76% less volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, WhiteHorse Finance has a beta of 1.3, indicating that its share price is 30% more volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current ratings and target prices for Nuveen Municipal Income Fund and WhiteHorse Finance, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Nuveen Municipal Income Fund	0	0	0	0	N/A
WhiteHorse Finance	1	2	1	0	2.00

WhiteHorse Finance has a consensus target price of $12.81, indicating a potential upside of 3.49%. Given WhiteHorse Finance’s higher probable upside, analysts plainly believe WhiteHorse Finance is more favorable than Nuveen Municipal Income Fund.

Dividends

Nuveen Municipal Income Fund pays an annual dividend of $0.40 per share and has a dividend yield of 4.0%. WhiteHorse Finance pays an annual dividend of $1.54 per share and has a dividend yield of 12.4%. WhiteHorse Finance pays out 187.8% of its earnings in the form of a dividend, suggesting it may not have sufficient earnings to cover its dividend payment in the future.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

16.6% of Nuveen Municipal Income Fund shares are owned by institutional investors. Comparatively, 13.2% of WhiteHorse Finance shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.0% of Nuveen Municipal Income Fund shares are owned by company insiders. Comparatively, 2.3% of WhiteHorse Finance shares are owned by company insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, large money managers and hedge funds believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Nuveen Municipal Income Fund and WhiteHorse Finance’s gross revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Nuveen Municipal Income Fund	$4.57 million	22.03	N/A	N/A	N/A
WhiteHorse Finance	$103.26 million	2.79	$20.41 million	$0.82	15.10

WhiteHorse Finance has higher revenue and earnings than Nuveen Municipal Income Fund.

Profitability

This table compares Nuveen Municipal Income Fund and WhiteHorse Finance’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Nuveen Municipal Income Fund	N/A	N/A	N/A
WhiteHorse Finance	18.40%	13.40%	5.74%

Summary

WhiteHorse Finance beats Nuveen Municipal Income Fund on 9 of the 12 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Nuveen Municipal Income Fund

Nuveen Municipal Income Fund, Inc. is a closed ended fixed income mutual fund launched by Nuveen Investments Inc. The fund is co-managed by Nuveen Fund Advisors LLC and Nuveen Asset Management, LLC. It invests in the fixed income markets of the United States. The fund primarily invests in municipal obligations issued by state and local government authorities. Its investment portfolio comprises investment in companies operating in various industries, including healthcare, materials, education and civic organizations, and consumer staples. Nuveen Municipal Income Fund was formed on April 20, 1988 and is based in the United States.

About WhiteHorse Finance

WhiteHorse Finance, Inc. is business development company, non-diversified, closed end management company specializing in originating senior secured loans, lower middle market, growth capital industries. It invests in broadline retail, office services and supplies, building products, health care services, health care supplies, research and consulting services, application software, home furnishings, specialized consumer services, data processing and outsourced services, leisure facilities, cable, and satellite. It prefers to invest in United States. It typically invests between $5 million to $25 million in companies having enterprise value of between $50 million and $350 million.