A Poor Quarter amidst Sluggish Expectations
Wall Street was not expecting very much from Statoil in the fourth quarter, but they got even less than that. Of course, "not expecting very much" is a relative judgment - Statoil still produced almost 17% revenue growth and 19% operating profit growth.
Unfortunately, during that same period the company saw a 23% increase in the average price for petroleum liquids and a 17% increase in natural gas prices. What that highlights is that once again production was a significant issue. Total production in the quarter fell more than 5% to about 1.95 billion barrels of oil equivalent per day, with lifted volumes of liquids (more valuable in today's price environment) down 8%.
The full article can be found at:
http://stocks.investopedia.
2 comments:
Statoil has one other thing going for it - it's from Norway. Much of the remaining reserves of oil in the world are held by countries whose leaders are inimical to the US and its allies. Hardly anybody hates Norway - that and STO's deep-water harsh-climate expertise may give it a leg up on competitors in such situations. On the other hand, the jekyll and hyde nature of some leaders of oil-rich nations (like Hugo Chavez) lends an unquantifiable amount of risk to an already risky business. If only there were oil in a nice cold place with no dictators...
Hah! Indeed!
How inconvenient that the stuff we need is so often in unpleasantly hot places run by unpleasant people.
One other positive aspect to STO, though, is the kroner. I'm not saying I'd sell all my dollars and pile into kroner, but that could be a bit of a tailwind for the stock.
Post a Comment