When close to half the companies in the United States have price-to-earnings ratios (or "P/E's") above 17x, you may consider Corporación América Airports S.A. (NYSE:CAAP) as an attractive investment with its 10.9x 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 its earnings growth in positive territory compared to the declining earnings of most other companies, Corporación América Airports has been doing quite well of late. It might be that many expect the strong earnings performance to degrade substantially, possibly more than the market, which has repressed the P/E. If you like the company, you'd be hoping this isn't the case so that you could potentially pick up some stock while it's out of favour.

How Is Corporación América Airports' Growth Trending?

In order to justify its P/E ratio, Corporación América Airports would need to produce sluggish growth that's trailing the market.

If we review the last year of earnings growth, the company posted a terrific increase of 42%. Still, EPS has barely risen at all from three years ago in total, which is not ideal. Accordingly, shareholders probably wouldn't have been overly satisfied with the unstable medium-term growth rates.

Shifting to the future, estimates from the dual analysts covering the company suggest earnings growth is heading into negative territory, declining 21% over the next year. Meanwhile, the broader market is forecast to expand by 11%, which paints a poor picture.

In light of this, it's understandable that Corporación América Airports' P/E would sit below the majority of other companies. However, shrinking earnings are unlikely to lead to a stable P/E over the longer term. Even just maintaining these prices could be difficult to achieve as the weak outlook is weighing down the shares.

The Key Takeaway

Using the price-to-earnings ratio alone to determine if you should sell your stock isn't sensible, however it can be a practical guide to the company's future prospects.

We've established that Corporación América Airports maintains its low P/E on the weakness of its forecast for sliding earnings, 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.

Before you settle on your opinion, we've discovered 2 warning signs for Corporación América Airports (1 is a bit unpleasant!) that you should be aware of.

It's important to make sure you look for a great company, not just the first idea you come across. So take a peek at this free list of interesting companies with strong recent earnings growth (and a low P/E).

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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.