2 Oil and Gas Companies Throwing Off Cash

These cash-rich companies generating a gusher of cash and the CEOs are buying hand over fist.

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Sep 20, 2021
Summary
  • Energy Transfer is one of the largest mid-stream oil and gas pipelines in the US.
  • Continental Resources is a shale driller with vast acreage in the Bakken and Oklahoma.
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Finding value stocks is getting difficult now, but there are still pockets of value in certain sectors like pharmaceuticals, commercial real estate and oil and gas. I ran a screen on GuruFocus looking for companies with high capitalization rates in asset heavy industries. In addition, I looked for companies that have high owner's earnings as well. Ideally, insiders should be buying, since this decreases the likelihood of the stock being in permanent decline.

I managed to find two stocks that meet the above criteria: Energy Transfer LP (ET, Financial) and Continental Resources Inc (CLR, Financial). Both have high capitalization rates and high owners earnings, as well as insider buying. Both are headed by founder CEO's (Warren Kelcy and Howard Hamm, respectively.)

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Owner earnings is a valuation method detailed by Warren Buffett (Trades, Portfolio) in Berkshire Hathaway's (BRK.A, Financial)(BRK.B, Financial) annual report in 1986. He explained that the value of a company is simply the total of the net cash flows expected to occur over the life of the business, minus any reinvestment of earnings. In practice its calculated as follows:

"Owner Earnings = (a) Net Income plus (b) depreciation, depletion, amortization, and other non-cash charges minus (c) average annual maintenance capital expenditures."

The Owner's Earnings yield is simply owner's earnings per share divided by share price.

Modified capitalization rate is simply cash flow from operations (OCF) divided by market capitalization. It shows the cash earning power of the company.

Energy Transfer

Energy Transfer (ET, Financial) is one of the biggest mid-stream oil and gas pipeline companies in the United States. With the reopening of the economy and the increase in volume going through its pipes, Energy Transfer's operating cash flow has surged, but its share price remains depressed.

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Insiders are buying shares quite a bit, as shown below:

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Morningstar analysts rate the stock as 5-star with a fair value of around $18. Value Line considers the stock to be faily valued in the short term, but its three to five year target it $15 to $25. The company pays a dividend yielding 6.7%. Warren Kelcy owns ~10% of the outstanding shares and controls the General Partner. LE GP LLC.

Value investor David Abrams (Trades, Portfolio) holds over 22 million shares. David Tepper (Trades, Portfolio) also owns a considerable amount, though he appears to be dialing down.

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Continental Resources

Continental Resources (CLR, Financial) is one of the biggest shale companies active in the Bakken shale and the Stack and Scoop play in Oklahoma. The company is certainly gushing cash now.

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Harold Hamm has being buying stock hand over fist, so it seems the stock might have the vote of confidence of a director and 10% owner.

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According to GuruFocus, the projected free cash flow valuation is showing a considerable margin of safety. While the $89 value does look excessive to me, I think it is safe to say that the stock is likely to be worth more than it trades at present.

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As an exploration and production company, Continental Resources' stock price heavily depends on the price of oil (WTI). Morningstar and Value Line both consider the stock to be somewhat overvalued at present.

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Bill Smead (Smead Value Fund (Trades, Portfolio)) had some interesting comments about Continental Resources when he was last speaking at GuruFocus' Value Investing Live on Sept. 8, 2021. He said that Continental Resources was his biggest position because they owned more oil in the ground per share than any other U.S. company, had more undrilled acreage and the stock was still cheap at current prices with WTI at nearly $80.

Before the pandemic, the stock was trading at around the same price with oil at around $60, as seen in the chart below, while it well over $70 now. Plus, he liked the fact of heavy insider ownership by the Chairman Howard Hamm, who has 82% ownership of the company whose interests are aligned with the investors. He added that the current ESG trend has caused many institutions to divest oil stocks prematurely.

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Conclusion

Since oil and gas stocks have run up with the increase in oil and gas prices, value is now sparse in this space, which has taken off with a bang. However, both these stocks have solid insider support and huge free cash flows.

Energy Transfer appears to me as a safer bet than Continental Resources. It is not directly exposed to the price of oil and gas, like Continental Resources. Also, Energy Transfer pays out a considerable dividend, so we get paid for waiting for price to catch up to value. Continental Resources has already quadrupled from the pandemic lows and I am doubtful that it can double from here, but further gains for Energy Transfer seem plausible.

Disclosures

I am/ we are currently short the stocks mentioned. Click for the complete disclosure