When close to half the companies in the United States have price-to-earnings ratios (or "P/E's") above 18x, you may consider Markel Group Inc. (NYSE:MKL) as a highly attractive investment with its 7x P/E ratio. Nonetheless, we'd need to dig a little deeper to determine if there is a rational basis for the highly reduced P/E.

Markel Group 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 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.

Is There Any Growth For Markel Group?

There's an inherent assumption that a company should far underperform the market for P/E ratios like Markel Group's to be considered reasonable.

Retrospectively, the last year delivered an exceptional 55% gain to the company's bottom line. The latest three year period has also seen a 27% overall rise in EPS, aided extensively by its short-term performance. So we can start by confirming that the company has actually done a good job of growing earnings over that time.

Shifting to the future, estimates from the five analysts covering the company suggest earnings growth is heading into negative territory, declining 12% per annum over the next three years. That's not great when the rest of the market is expected to grow by 11% per year.

With this information, we are not surprised that Markel Group is trading at a P/E lower than the market. However, shrinking earnings are unlikely to lead to a stable P/E over the longer term. There's potential for the P/E to fall to even lower levels if the company doesn't improve its profitability.

What We Can Learn From Markel Group's P/E?

It's argued the price-to-earnings ratio is an inferior measure of value within certain industries, but it can be a powerful business sentiment indicator.

As we suspected, our examination of Markel Group's analyst forecasts revealed that its outlook for shrinking earnings is contributing to its low P/E. 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 settle on your opinion, we've discovered 1 warning sign for Markel Group that you should be aware of.

If P/E ratios interest you, you may wish to see this free collection of other companies with strong earnings growth and low P/E ratios.

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