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Vision Values Holdings Limited (HKG:862) shareholders have had their patience rewarded with a 36% share price jump in the last month. Taking a wider view, although not as strong as the last month, the full year gain of 13% is also fairly reasonable.

In spite of the firm bounce in price, when close to half the companies operating in Hong Kong's IT industry have price-to-sales ratios (or "P/S") above 1.1x, you may still consider Vision Values Holdings as an enticing stock to check out with its 0.3x P/S ratio. However, the P/S might be low for a reason and it requires further investigation to determine if it's justified.

See our latest analysis for Vision Values Holdings

What Does Vision Values Holdings' Recent Performance Look Like?

The recent revenue growth at Vision Values Holdings would have to be considered satisfactory if not spectacular. Perhaps the market believes the recent revenue performance might fall short of industry figures in the near future, leading to a reduced P/S. 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.

Do Revenue Forecasts Match The Low P/S Ratio?

In order to justify its P/S ratio, Vision Values Holdings would need to produce sluggish growth that's trailing the industry.

Taking a look back first, we see that the company managed to grow revenues by a handy 7.4% last year. Spectacularly, three year revenue growth has ballooned by several orders of magnitude, even though the last 12 months were fairly tame in comparison. So we can start by confirming that the company has done a tremendous job of growing revenue over that time.

This is in contrast to the rest of the industry, which is expected to grow by 9.6% over the next year, materially lower than the company's recent medium-term annualised growth rates.

With this in mind, we find it intriguing that Vision Values Holdings' P/S isn't as high compared to that of its industry peers. Apparently some shareholders believe the recent performance has exceeded its limits and have been accepting significantly lower selling prices.

The Key Takeaway

The latest share price surge wasn't enough to lift Vision Values Holdings' P/S close to the industry median. 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're very surprised to see Vision Values Holdings currently trading on a much lower than expected P/S since its recent three-year growth is higher than the wider industry forecast. Potential investors that are sceptical over continued revenue performance may be preventing the P/S ratio from matching previous strong performance. While recent revenue trends over the past medium-term suggest that the risk of a price decline is low, investors appear to perceive a likelihood of revenue fluctuations in the future.

And what about other risks? Every company has them, and we've spotted 3 warning signs for Vision Values Holdings (of which 2 are concerning!) you should know about.

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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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.