It’s getting near time for Procter & Gamble Co (NYSE:PG) to put up or shut up. P&G has spent years creating a smaller, more nimble company, divesting its beauty brands to Coty Inc (NYSE:COTY), taking some $10 billion in costs out of the business, shutting down low-margin products overseas, and re-organizing itself into 10 categories.

The idea was that a smaller, more-focused Procter & Gamble could better drive organic growth. Yet so far it’s done little: PG stock has underperformed the S&P 500 over one-, three-, five- and 10-year periods, even including dividends.

And there really is little left for the company to do to move the needle for PG stock going forward. As an analyst asked on management’s earnings call in November: “where do we go from here?” Procter & Gamble needs to start answering that question for shares to catch up with the rest of the market.

I remain skeptical that P&G has an answer investors will want to hear.

Organic Growth

The long-running problem for Procter & Gamble has been that sales growth has slowed to just 1% in both fiscal 2015 and fiscal 2016. Compare that with organic revenue that increased an average 5.5% a year between 2005 and 2008.

It’s not surprise that lower revenue growth has hit margins. P&G hasn’t been able to leverage fixed costs, even with a hugely aggressive cost-reduction program, including a 24% cut in headcount exclusive of its manufacturing facilities. Currency has been a problem, to be sure. But “Core EPS,” as Procter & Gamble terms its adjusted EPS figure, hasn’t budged. It was $3.87 in fiscal 2011, and P&G is guiding investors to a similar level some six years later.

Over that period, however, PG stock has gained more than 40% — due solely to multiple expansion. An earnings multiple of ~15x-16x has become ~23x — the highest it has racked up in well over a decade. Obviously, investors are pricing in bump in growth, based in part due to changes of the past few years.

If that acceleration doesn’t come, however, P&G is in trouble.

Where Do We Go From Here?

The problem for PG stock is that without revenue expansion, there really aren’t any upside catalysts. A 23x earnings multiple is well above the market as a whole (on an adjusted basis) and isn’t going to expand if earnings stay flat. There’s little room left for margin expansion if organic growth is less than 2%; Procter & Gamble already has cut billions of dollars in costs.

If anything, keeping margins steady is a major concern, even with better revenue growth. P&G’s Gillette unit just cut prices on its razors, affecting the company’s highest-margin category. It’s ramped up sampling and marketing spending elsewhere to boost top-line growth.

Yet the company — even in a second-quarter report that the market received favorably — didn’t gain market share in any of its five major reporting categories.

Procter & Gamble does have an activist investor in Trian Partners, which took a $3.5 billion stake late last year. But Trian — best-known for pushing into Heinz into a merger with Kraft and creating Kraft Foods Co (NASDAQ:KHC) — doesn’t have that many levers left to pull. A face-off with activist hedge fund manager Bill Ackman (of Herbalife Ltd. (NYSE:HLF) fame), who pushed for the aforementioned cost cuts, and helped shove former CEO Bob McDonald out the door. But again, the fundamental concerns haven’t eased.

PG Stock Will Disappoint

Procter & Gamble simply can’t afford a disappointing earnings report in Q3 — or any time soon, really. A 23x multiple is pricing in concrete results from the company’s transformation. The Q2 report was modestly positive on that front, and as our Richard Saintvilus pointed out, P&G raised organic revenue growth guidance for the year.

But even hiked  to 2-3%, the growth isn’t good enough particularly if pricing is pressured and marketing spending is up. A little bit of a revenue increase and a little bit of margin expansion means basically flat profits. And flat profits don’t support a 23x multiple — or a share price for PG stock near $90.

If Procter & Gamble can show better growth in Q3, maybe the bull case here has some legs. For now, it seems more like investors are ignoring history and embracing the reputation of PG stock as a “safe” play. But at a historically high earnings multiple, and with historically low growth, shares are anything but safe.

And if earnings don’t show some reason for longer-term optimism, the market will figure that out quickly.

As of this writing, Vince Martin did not hold a position in any of the aforementioned securities.