When close to half the companies in the United States have price-to-earnings ratios (or "P/E's") above 17x, you may consider Lamb Weston Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:LW) as an attractive investment with its 13x P/E ratio. However, the P/E might be low for a reason and it requires further investigation to determine if it's justified.

Lamb Weston Holdings certainly has been doing a good job lately as its earnings growth has been positive while most other companies have been seeing their earnings go backwards. One possibility is that the P/E is low because investors think the company's earnings are going to fall away like everyone else's soon. If not, then existing shareholders have reason to be quite optimistic about the future direction of the share price.

Is There Any Growth For Lamb Weston Holdings?

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

Retrospectively, the last year delivered an exceptional 137% gain to the company's bottom line. Pleasingly, EPS has also lifted 285% in aggregate from three years ago, thanks to the last 12 months of growth. Therefore, it's fair to say the earnings growth recently has been superb for the company.

Looking ahead now, EPS is anticipated to slump, contracting by 1.5% per year during the coming three years according to the ten analysts following the company. That's not great when the rest of the market is expected to grow by 10% per year.

With this information, we are not surprised that Lamb Weston Holdings is trading at a P/E lower than the market. Nonetheless, there's no guarantee the P/E has reached a floor yet with earnings going in reverse. Even just maintaining these prices could be difficult to achieve as the weak outlook is weighing down the shares.

What We Can Learn From Lamb Weston 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.

We've established that Lamb Weston Holdings maintains its low P/E on the weakness of its forecast for sliding earnings, as expected. Right now shareholders are accepting the low P/E as they concede future earnings probably won't provide any pleasant surprises. Unless these conditions improve, they will continue to form a barrier for the share price around these levels.

Before you take the next step, you should know about the 2 warning signs for Lamb Weston Holdings (1 is a bit unpleasant!) that we have uncovered.

Of course, you might find a fantastic investment by looking at a few good candidates. So take a peek at this free list of companies with a strong growth track record, trading on a low P/E.

Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team (at) simplywallst.com.
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.