With a price-to-earnings (or "P/E") ratio of 5.8x CGN New Energy Holdings Co., Ltd. (HKG:1811) may be sending very bullish signals at the moment, given that almost half of all companies in Hong Kong have P/E ratios greater than 12x and even P/E's higher than 26x are not unusual. Although, it's not wise to just take the P/E at face value as there may be an explanation why it's so limited.
CGN New Energy Holdings hasn't been tracking well recently as its declining earnings compare poorly to other companies, which have seen some growth on average. The P/E is probably low because investors think this poor earnings performance isn't going to get any better. If this is the case, then existing shareholders will probably struggle to get excited about the future direction of the share price.
Check out our latest analysis for CGN New Energy Holdings
Is There Any Growth For CGN New Energy Holdings?
CGN New Energy Holdings' P/E ratio would be typical for a company that's expected to deliver very poor growth or even falling earnings, and importantly, perform much worse than the market.
Retrospectively, the last year delivered a frustrating 7.3% decrease to the company's bottom line. Unfortunately, that's brought it right back to where it started three years ago with EPS growth being virtually non-existent overall during that time. So it appears to us that the company has had a mixed result in terms of growing earnings over that time.
Looking ahead now, EPS is anticipated to climb by 20% during the coming year according to the only analyst following the company. Meanwhile, the rest of the market is forecast to expand by 19%, which is not materially different.
In light of this, it's peculiar that CGN New Energy Holdings' P/E sits below the majority of other companies. Apparently some shareholders are doubtful of the forecasts and have been accepting lower selling prices.
The Bottom Line On CGN New Energy Holdings' P/E
Generally, our preference is to limit the use of the price-to-earnings ratio to establishing what the market thinks about the overall health of a company.
Our examination of CGN New Energy Holdings' analyst forecasts revealed that its market-matching earnings outlook isn't contributing to its P/E as much as we would have predicted. There could be some unobserved threats to earnings preventing the P/E ratio from matching the outlook. It appears some are indeed anticipating earnings instability, because these conditions should normally provide more support to the share price.
There are also other vital risk factors to consider and we've discovered 2 warning signs for CGN New Energy Holdings (1 doesn't sit too well with us!) that you should be aware of before investing here.
If P/E ratios interest you, you may wish to see this free collection of other companies with strong earnings growth and low P/E ratios.
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