Imperial Oil (IMO.TO)

A great, solid, well-run company, and you can tell that by the way it trades. Free cash flow profile looks healthy, which is good for the investor. Because it is such a good quality company with less beta than the rest of the group, in a rising price environment you are not going to get as much appreciation as you would in some others. This is a company you don’t want to own coming out of a recovery. Also. refining margins are coming down. Feels some of the best upside is going to be in the pure play rather than in an integrated story.

If you strictly want yield or safety on a Canadian energy, you are probably better off playing the parent Exxon (XOM-N) in the US. He would be more inclined to go to any of the producers that can grow their production a lot more effectively than this company can. This is more of a defensive holding when the sector rolls over.

Just reported and earnings were not that great. Not a real surprise as it is 83% in the oil area. Has been a very steady producer for years and years. The real problem coming out of their earnings was that people had thought it would do better downstream than what it did. He is basically standing back from the oil/gas sector. Doesn’t see us reaching some stability until maybe 2016.

(A Top Pick July 3/14. Down 17.35%.) 1995 was the last time this company had traded at this valuation. Oils are certainly out of favour, and with all the oils they are going to go back and retest their lows that they made in December. This is a good company.

(Top Pick June 27/14, Down 12.50%) It is an integrated oil and if oil prices are weak then one side would balance out the other within the business. He never expected oil to go down this much. This one has performed well relative to the oil sector. He is indifferent to the stock right now and issued a sell to the company last time he was on.

A very conservative company. You get a very large, conservative, portion of Exxon Mobile. It is not the best and not the worst. He thinks there is better risk/return profiles out there with a better yield.

(A Top Pick June 17/14. Down 9.86%.) Has held up fairly well. Currently trading at about its FMV.

They get more from downstream business than upstream business. A lot of the recent increase in share value was on refining. He does not like the risk reward ratio on this one, nor SU-T. There is a lot of overhead resistance.

Given the current price, looking out over the next few years he can see other companies in the sector that are perhaps selling at more modest multiples to the potential growth.

They have gone ahead and affected a lot of assets. They spent a lot recently in CapX. They are well managed and a great growth company. Only 23% in debt. Downstream assets have huge earnings power. They earned as much in refining as in upstream operations.

A lower yielder, so he doesn’t own it. Great business. Superior assets.

This is by far the best operator with the highest returns. While others were cutting dividends and slashing CapX budgets. This one did not cut its CapX budget. It has one of the highest and most stable ROE’s out of all the energy companies in Canada.

Likes long life assets. There are operational inefficiencies they could iron out. It would make sense for them to acquire COS-T.

For anyone who has had exposure in the energy space, this has been a great place to be because of the diversification in their business line in refining and downstream. Very under leveraged. Majority of its oil production in Canada is long life, low decline and low required investment assets.

Would prefer Canadian Natural Resources (CNQ-T), which is much larger and more diversified.