Clean Seas Seafood Limited (ASX:CSS) shareholders are no doubt pleased to see that the share price has bounced 45% in the last month, although it is still struggling to make up recently lost ground. Unfortunately, the gains of the last month did little to right the losses of the last year with the stock still down 48% over that time.

Although its price has surged higher, given about half the companies operating in Australia's Food industry have price-to-sales ratios (or "P/S") above 1x, you may still consider Clean Seas Seafood as an attractive investment with its 0.4x P/S ratio. Nonetheless, we'd need to dig a little deeper to determine if there is a rational basis for the reduced P/S.

Check out our latest analysis for Clean Seas Seafood

What Does Clean Seas Seafood's P/S Mean For Shareholders?

For example, consider that Clean Seas Seafood's financial performance has been pretty ordinary lately as revenue growth is non-existent. One possibility is that the P/S is low because investors think this benign revenue growth rate will likely underperform the broader industry in the near future. If not, then existing shareholders may be feeling optimistic about the future direction of the share price.

Want the full picture on earnings, revenue and cash flow for the company? Then our free report on Clean Seas Seafood will help you shine a light on its historical performance.

How Is Clean Seas Seafood's Revenue Growth Trending?

There's an inherent assumption that a company should underperform the industry for P/S ratios like Clean Seas Seafood's to be considered reasonable.

Taking a look back first, we see that there was hardly any revenue growth to speak of for the company over the past year. However, a few strong years before that means that it was still able to grow revenue by an impressive 42% in total over the last three years. Accordingly, shareholders will be pleased, but also have some questions to ponder about the last 12 months.

Comparing the recent medium-term revenue trends against the industry's one-year growth forecast of 19% shows it's noticeably less attractive.

With this in consideration, it's easy to understand why Clean Seas Seafood's P/S falls short of the mark set by its industry peers. It seems most investors are expecting to see the recent limited growth rates continue into the future and are only willing to pay a reduced amount for the stock.

The Final Word

The latest share price surge wasn't enough to lift Clean Seas Seafood's P/S close to the industry median. While the price-to-sales ratio shouldn't be the defining factor in whether you buy a stock or not, it's quite a capable barometer of revenue expectations.

In line with expectations, Clean Seas Seafood maintains its low P/S on the weakness of its recent three-year growth being lower than the wider industry forecast. At this stage investors feel the potential for an improvement in revenue isn't great enough to justify a higher P/S ratio. Unless the recent medium-term conditions improve, they will continue to form a barrier for the share price around these levels.

You need to take note of risks, for example - Clean Seas Seafood has 3 warning signs (and 2 which are potentially serious) we think 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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