There's Reason For Concern Over Cogna Educação S.A.'s (BVMF:COGN3) Price

It's not a stretch to say that Cogna Educação S.A.'s (BVMF:COGN3) price-to-sales (or "P/S") ratio of 1x right now seems quite "middle-of-the-road" for companies in the Consumer Services industry in Brazil, where the median P/S ratio is around 0.8x. While this might not raise any eyebrows, if the P/S ratio is not justified investors could be missing out on a potential opportunity or ignoring looming disappointment.

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See our latest analysis for Cogna Educação

What Does Cogna Educação's Recent Performance Look Like?

Cogna Educação certainly has been doing a good job lately as it's been growing revenue more than most other companies. It might be that many expect the strong revenue performance to wane, which has kept the P/S ratio from rising. If the company manages to stay the course, then investors should be rewarded with a share price that matches its revenue figures.

If you'd like to see what analysts are forecasting going forward, you should check out our free report on Cogna Educação.

How Is Cogna Educação's Revenue Growth Trending?

There's an inherent assumption that a company should be matching the industry for P/S ratios like Cogna Educação's to be considered reasonable.

Retrospectively, the last year delivered a decent 14% gain to the company's revenues. Pleasingly, revenue has also lifted 43% in aggregate from three years ago, partly thanks to the last 12 months of growth. Therefore, it's fair to say the revenue growth recently has been superb for the company.

Looking ahead now, revenue is anticipated to climb by 6.6% each year during the coming three years according to the twelve analysts following the company. That's shaping up to be materially lower than the 10% each year growth forecast for the broader industry.

In light of this, it's curious that Cogna Educação's P/S sits in line with the majority of other companies. It seems most investors are ignoring the fairly limited growth expectations and are willing to pay up for exposure to the stock. Maintaining these prices will be difficult to achieve as this level of revenue growth is likely to weigh down the shares eventually.

What Does Cogna Educação's P/S Mean For Investors?

Typically, we'd caution against reading too much into price-to-sales ratios when settling on investment decisions, though it can reveal plenty about what other market participants think about the company.

Given that Cogna Educação's revenue growth projections are relatively subdued in comparison to the wider industry, it comes as a surprise to see it trading at its current P/S ratio. When we see companies with a relatively weaker revenue outlook compared to the industry, we suspect the share price is at risk of declining, sending the moderate P/S lower. This places shareholders' investments at risk and potential investors in danger of paying an unnecessary premium.

Before you take the next step, you should know about the 2 warning signs for Cogna Educação (1 is potentially serious!) that we have uncovered.

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This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.