Update: dictionary.com says twice a year... it continues with the definition with every two years: Biennial. In Britain, it seems, it might mean both... but in the U.S. biannual means twice a year.
We're talking about the price-to-earnings, or P/E, ratio. The current 12-month forward P/E ratio is 16.8, FactSet's John Butters said on Friday. This P/E ratio is above the 5-year average (13.8) and the 10-year average (14.1).. But just because stocks are expensive relative to their long-term average is no guarantee that prices are doomed to fall immediately.
The price earnings ratio, often called the P/E ratio or price to earnings ratio, is a market prospect ratio that calculates the market value of a stock relative to its earnings by comparing the market price per share by the earnings per share.n other words, the price earnings ratio shows what the market is willing to pay for a stock based on its current earnings. Investors often use this ratio to evaluate what a stock's fair market value should be by predicting future earnings per share.