Chengdu Kanghua Biological Products Co., Ltd. (SZSE:300841) shares have had a horrible month, losing 29% after a relatively good period beforehand. The drop over the last 30 days has capped off a tough year for shareholders, with the share price down 45% in that time.

Following the heavy fall in price, Chengdu Kanghua Biological Products may be sending bullish signals at the moment with its price-to-earnings (or "P/E") ratio of 15.3x, since almost half of all companies in China have P/E ratios greater than 28x and even P/E's higher than 50x are not unusual. 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, Chengdu Kanghua Biological Products has been very sluggish. The P/E is probably low because investors think this poor earnings performance isn't going to improve at all. 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.

Does Growth Match The Low P/E?

Chengdu Kanghua Biological Products' P/E ratio would be typical for a company that's only expected to deliver limited growth, and importantly, perform worse than the market.

If we review the last year of earnings, dishearteningly the company's profits fell to the tune of 33%. The last three years don't look nice either as the company has shrunk EPS by 10% in aggregate. Accordingly, shareholders would have felt downbeat about the medium-term rates of earnings growth.

Turning to the outlook, the next year should generate growth of 36% as estimated by the three analysts watching the company. Meanwhile, the rest of the market is forecast to expand by 41%, which is noticeably more attractive.

In light of this, it's understandable that Chengdu Kanghua Biological Products' P/E sits below the majority of other companies. Apparently many shareholders weren't comfortable holding on while the company is potentially eyeing a less prosperous future.

The Key Takeaway

The softening of Chengdu Kanghua Biological Products' shares means its P/E is now sitting at a pretty low level. It's argued the price-to-earnings ratio is an inferior measure of value within certain industries, but it can be a powerful business sentiment indicator.

We've established that Chengdu Kanghua Biological Products maintains its low P/E on the weakness of its forecast growth being lower than the wider market, as expected. At this stage investors feel the potential for an improvement in earnings isn't great enough to justify a higher P/E ratio. It's hard to see the share price rising strongly in the near future under these circumstances.

You always need to take note of risks, for example - Chengdu Kanghua Biological Products has 1 warning sign we think you should be aware 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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