Here’s How P/E Ratios Can Help Us Understand B.O.S Better Online Solutions Ltd. (NASDAQ:BOSC)
This article is written for those who want to get better at using price to earnings ratios (P/E ratios). We’ll look at B.O.S Better Online Solutions Ltd.’s (NASDAQ:BOSC) P/E ratio and reflect on what it tells us about the company’s share price. B.O.S Better Online Solutions has a P/E ratio of 8.47, based on the last twelve months. That is equivalent to an earnings yield of about 12%.
View our latest analysis for B.O.S Better Online Solutions
How Do You Calculate A P/E Ratio?
The formula for price to earnings is:
Price to Earnings Ratio = Share Price ÷ Earnings per Share (EPS)
Or for B.O.S Better Online Solutions:
P/E of 8.47 = $2.31 ÷ $0.27 (Based on the year to September 2018.)
Is A High Price-to-Earnings Ratio Good?
A higher P/E ratio means that buyers have to pay a higher price for each $1 the company has earned over the last year. That isn’t necessarily good or bad, but a high P/E implies relatively high expectations of what a company can achieve in the future.
How Growth Rates Impact P/E Ratios
Earnings growth rates have a big influence on P/E ratios. That’s because companies that grow earnings per share quickly will rapidly increase the ‘E’ in the equation. Therefore, even if you pay a high multiple of earnings now, that multiple will become lower in the future. A lower P/E should indicate the stock is cheap relative to others — and that may attract buyers.
Most would be impressed by B.O.S Better Online Solutions earnings growth of 25% in the last year. And its annual EPS growth rate over 5 years is 38%. This could arguably justify a relatively high P/E ratio.
How Does B.O.S Better Online Solutions’s P/E Ratio Compare To Its Peers?
The P/E ratio essentially measures market expectations of a company. We can see in the image below that the average P/E (28.3) for companies in the communications industry is higher than B.O.S Better Online Solutions’s P/E.
B.O.S Better Online Solutions’s P/E tells us that market participants think it will not fare as well as its peers in the same industry. While current expectations are low, the stock could be undervalued if the situation is better than the market assumes. If you consider the stock interesting, further research is recommended. For example, I often monitor director buying and selling.
Remember: P/E Ratios Don’t Consider The Balance Sheet
The ‘Price’ in P/E reflects the market capitalization of the company. In other words, it does not consider any debt or cash that the company may have on the balance sheet. In theory, a company can lower its future P/E ratio by using cash or debt to invest in growth.
Such spending might be good or bad, overall, but the key point here is that you need to look at debt to understand the P/E ratio in context.
Is Debt Impacting B.O.S Better Online Solutions’s P/E?
B.O.S Better Online Solutions has net debt worth 14% of its market capitalization. That’s enough debt to impact the P/E ratio a little; so keep it in mind if you’re comparing it to companies without debt.
The Bottom Line On B.O.S Better Online Solutions’s P/E Ratio
B.O.S Better Online Solutions trades on a P/E ratio of 8.5, which is below the US market average of 16.8. The EPS growth last year was strong, and debt levels are quite reasonable. If it continues to grow, then the current low P/E may prove to be unjustified.
When the market is wrong about a stock, it gives savvy investors an opportunity. As value investor Benjamin Graham famously said, ‘In the short run, the market is a voting machine but in the long run, it is a weighing machine.’ Although we don’t have analyst forecasts, shareholders might want to examine this detailed historical graph of earnings, revenue and cash flow.
You might be able to find a better buy than B.O.S Better Online Solutions. If you want a selection of possible winners, check out this free list of interesting companies that trade on a P/E below 20 (but have proven they can grow earnings).
To help readers see past the short term volatility of the financial market, we aim to bring you a long-term focused research analysis purely driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis does not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements.
The author is an independent contributor and at the time of publication had no position in the stocks mentioned. For errors that warrant correction please contact the editor at editorial-team@simplywallst.com.