In 2011 you could buy Nokia at about eight times earnings.
Largest phone maker on the planet, fourteen years running. More cash than some governments. A distribution network nobody could replicate. By every screen in existence, one of the cheapest large companies available.
The screens were reading the price correctly. They were reading the earnings wrong, because those earnings were about to stop existing.
This is the trap in the whole idea of cheapness. A multiple compares today's price to a number from the past. When the market marks something down hard, it is usually forecasting that the number is going to fall. Sometimes the market is wrong and you get paid for noticing. Often it is right, and the ratio you liked was the last readable thing on a melting business.
So the useful question is never "why is this cheap". It is "what does the market think is about to happen to the earnings, and do I have a reason to disagree".
Three things worth checking before a low multiple counts as interesting: where the profit actually comes from and whether that source is under attack, whether the cheapness is general to the sector or specific to this company, and whether the balance sheet buys you time to be right or starts a countdown.
The full argument, including what a low multiple does tell you and where valuation still earns its place, is here.
Read why cheap is a forecast: https://returnolio.com/blog/why-cheap-is-a-forecast
Returnolio is a publisher of research, not an investment adviser. Nothing above is a recommendation to buy or sell anything; it does not know your situation.