Blade Air Mobility, Inc. (NASDAQ:BLDE) shareholders would be excited to see that the share price has had a great month, posting a 28% gain and recovering from prior weakness. Looking back a bit further, it's encouraging to see the stock is up 72% in the last year.

Following the firm bounce in price, when almost half of the companies in the United States' Airlines industry have price-to-sales ratios (or "P/S") below 0.5x, you may consider Blade Air Mobility as a stock probably not worth researching with its 1.2x P/S ratio. Nonetheless, we'd need to dig a little deeper to determine if there is a rational basis for the elevated P/S.

What Does Blade Air Mobility's Recent Performance Look Like?

With revenue growth that's superior to most other companies of late, Blade Air Mobility has been doing relatively well. It seems the market expects this form will continue into the future, hence the elevated P/S ratio. However, if this isn't the case, investors might get caught out paying too much for the stock.

What Are Revenue Growth Metrics Telling Us About The High P/S?

There's an inherent assumption that a company should outperform the industry for P/S ratios like Blade Air Mobility's to be considered reasonable.

If we review the last year of revenue growth, the company posted a terrific increase of 25%. This great performance means it was also able to deliver immense revenue growth over the last three years. So we can start by confirming that the company has done a tremendous job of growing revenue over that time.

Shifting to the future, estimates from the four analysts covering the company suggest revenue should grow by 9.7% over the next year. With the industry predicted to deliver 48% growth, the company is positioned for a weaker revenue result.

With this in consideration, we believe it doesn't make sense that Blade Air Mobility's P/S is outpacing its industry peers. It seems most investors are hoping for a turnaround in the company's business prospects, but the analyst cohort is not so confident this will happen. Only the boldest would assume these prices are sustainable as this level of revenue growth is likely to weigh heavily on the share price eventually.

The Final Word

The large bounce in Blade Air Mobility's shares has lifted the company's P/S handsomely. We'd say the price-to-sales ratio's power isn't primarily as a valuation instrument but rather to gauge current investor sentiment and future expectations.

We've concluded that Blade Air Mobility currently trades on a much higher than expected P/S since its forecast growth is lower than the wider industry. The weakness in the company's revenue estimate doesn't bode well for the elevated P/S, which could take a fall if the revenue sentiment doesn't improve. Unless these conditions improve markedly, it's very challenging to accept these prices as being reasonable.

Before you settle on your opinion, we've discovered 2 warning signs for Blade Air Mobility that you should be aware of.

If companies with solid past earnings growth is up your alley, you may wish to see this free collection of other companies with strong earnings growth and low P/E ratios.

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