Market Cool On OneMain Holdings, Inc.'s (NYSE:OMF) Earnings

When close to half the companies in the United States have price-to-earnings ratios (or "P/E's") above 19x, you may consider OneMain Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:OMF) as an attractive investment with its 9.9x P/E ratio. However, the P/E might be low for a reason and it requires further investigation to determine if it's justified.

With earnings that are retreating more than the market's of late, OneMain Holdings has been very sluggish. It seems that many are expecting the dismal earnings performance to persist, which has repressed the P/E. You'd much rather the company wasn't bleeding earnings if you still believe in the business. Or at the very least, you'd be hoping the earnings slide doesn't get any worse if your plan is to pick up some stock while it's out of favour.

View our latest analysis for OneMain Holdings

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Is There Any Growth For OneMain Holdings?

There's an inherent assumption that a company should underperform the market for P/E ratios like OneMain Holdings' to be considered reasonable.

If we review the last year of earnings, dishearteningly the company's profits fell to the tune of 7.9%. As a result, earnings from three years ago have also fallen 52% overall. Therefore, it's fair to say the earnings growth recently has been undesirable for the company.

Turning to the outlook, the next three years should generate growth of 18% per year as estimated by the ten analysts watching the company. Meanwhile, the rest of the market is forecast to only expand by 11% per annum, which is noticeably less attractive.

With this information, we find it odd that OneMain Holdings is trading at a P/E lower than the market. It looks like most investors are not convinced at all that the company can achieve future growth expectations.

The Key Takeaway

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.

We've established that OneMain Holdings currently trades on a much lower than expected P/E since its forecast growth is higher than the wider market. There could be some major unobserved threats to earnings preventing the P/E ratio from matching the positive outlook. It appears many are indeed anticipating earnings instability, because these conditions should normally provide a boost to the share price.

We don't want to rain on the parade too much, but we did also find 2 warning signs for OneMain Holdings (1 doesn't sit too well with us!) that you need to be mindful of.

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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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.