Heritage Global Inc. HGBL

Competitive advantage analysis · financial-services

Asset Management Specialized
Overall moat score
55/100
Moderate

About Heritage Global Inc.

Heritage Global Inc., together with its subsidiaries, operates as an asset services company with focus on financial and industrial asset transactions in the United States. It operates through three segments: Auction and Liquidation, Refurbishment and Resale, and Brokerage. The company offers a suite of market making, acquisitions, refurbishment, dispositions, valuations, and secured lending services. It also involved in the identifying, … Full HGBL analysis →

Competitive advantage assessment

Key strengths

  • Conservative Leverage Leverage is conservative vs peers (score 0.77).
  • Consistent Fee Structure Fee margin stability is solid (score 0.73).

Key risks

  • Below-Peer Return on Equity Return on equity lags peers (score 0.40).
  • AUM Contraction Risk Revenue growth trajectory is weak (score 0.35).

The dashed ring is the peer median. Defense scores are percentile ranks against peers, so 50 is roughly the typical company in this group.

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Fee Revenue Quality

Moderate
63

Where HGBL ranks in Capital Markets

Heritage Global Inc. ranks #29 of 67 scored companies in Capital Markets by moat score — the top 43%. The widest moat in the group is Interactive Brokers Group, Inc. (IBKR) at 83/100.

Moat scores for companies ranked near HGBL in Capital Markets
# Company Moat score Rating
25 Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (The) GS 59/100 Moderate
26 StoneX Group Inc. SNEX 57/100 Moderate
27 Siebert Financial Corp. SIEB 57/100 Moderate
28 CleanSpark, Inc. Warrant CLSKW 55/100 Moderate
29 Heritage Global Inc. HGBL 55/100 Moderate
30 Freedom Holding Corp. FRHC 52/100 Moderate
31 TOP Financial Group Limited TOP 52/100 Moderate
32 Abits Group Inc ABTS 51/100 Moderate
33 Perella Weinberg Partners PWP 51/100 Moderate

See every Asset Management & Capital Markets company ranked by moat score →

How HGBL scores on the Asset Management Specialized defenses

Fee Revenue Quality

Score 63 · 20% of the moat score

Fee revenue quality is the ability to charge above the industry's falling average and keep charging it.

Client Retention & Revenue Stickiness

Score 57 · 18% of the moat score

Assets under management leave far more easily than they arrive, and the fee leaves with them.

Compensation Discipline

Score 51 · 18% of the moat score

Compensation is the largest expense in asset management and the one that decides whether a good year ever reaches shareholders.

Capital Efficiency

Score 45 · 20% of the moat score

Asset managers are asset-light: with little capital employed, a healthy business should earn a very high return on equity, and a merely average one is a real warning.

Earnings Quality & Cash Conversion

Score 61 · 14% of the moat score

Reported profits here can be flattered by performance fees, seed-capital gains and consolidated fund accounting, none of which recur reliably.

Balance Sheet Strength

Score 56 · 10% of the moat score

Because the business needs so little capital, an asset manager carrying meaningful debt has usually borrowed to buy another manager or to fund distributions.

How each Asset Management Specialized defense is measured, in full →

Understanding HGBL's moat

What is Heritage Global Inc.'s moat score?

Heritage Global Inc. (HGBL) scores 55 out of 100 on the StatsAlpha Moat Map, which rates its competitive advantage as moderate. It ranks #29 of 67 scored companies in Capital Markets, the top 43%. The score is a weighted composite of 6 competitive defenses, each measured against industry peers of 74 companies in Capital Markets. Its strongest defense is Fee Revenue Quality (63/100) and its weakest is Capital Efficiency (45/100).

How does Heritage Global Inc. compare with other Capital Markets companies?

Heritage Global Inc. ranks #29 of 67 scored companies in Capital Markets by moat score. The widest moat in Capital Markets is Interactive Brokers Group, Inc. (IBKR) at 83/100. The companies ranked closest are CleanSpark, Inc. Warrant (CLSKW) at 55 just above it and Freedom Holding Corp. (FRHC) at 52 just below it.

How is the moat score calculated?

Each company is scored with an industry-specific template — Asset Management Specialized in this case, chosen because the defenses that matter to a bank are not the ones that matter to a software company. Every defense combines several financial signals, and each signal is measured as a percentile against a peer group of 74 companies in Capital Markets. The defenses are then weighted to produce the overall score out of 100.

Why is Heritage Global Inc. scored with the Asset Management Specialized template?

An asset manager owns almost nothing. It charges a fee on someone else's money, pays much of that fee out in compensation, and keeps the remainder — so its economics turn on the fee rate it can defend, whether client money stays, and how much revenue survives the bonus pool. The Asset Management template scores those questions rather than the balance sheet, which in this industry is largely beside the point.

Which competitive defenses are measured for Heritage Global Inc.?

The Asset Management Specialized template measures 6 defenses, and HGBL scores: Fee Revenue Quality (63), Client Retention & Revenue Stickiness (57), Compensation Discipline (51), Capital Efficiency (45), Earnings Quality & Cash Conversion (61), Balance Sheet Strength (56). Each is scored independently as a percentile against peers, so a company can be strong on one and weak on another — the overall score reflects how those defenses are weighted for this industry.

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