Covid crisis has driven oil price into negative territory for the first time in history last April, where oil futures’ sellers have to pay buyers to own the oil due to the lack of storage.
Since then, WTI oil price has recovered to USD60-70 per barrel. In fact, Crude Oil price has hit a high of USD75 per barrel this year, even higher than the pre-covid 2019 high of USD66 per barrel.
Following the recovery of oil prices, major players in Oil & Gas have also see their share prices recovered and continue to pay out attractive dividends.
Above is a table showing the performance of 6 oil counters namely Exxon, Shell, Chevron listed in NYSE and Sinopec, CNOOC, PetroChina listed in HKSE. Note that the Chinese oil counters are also listed in NYSE under different codes of SNP, CEO and PTR, but in this comparison, the HKSE counters are used for the Chinese companies.
In the table, share prices are compared between 3 May 2020 to 3 Sep 2021. Dividends paid out in 2020 and 2021 YTD are also recorded. The forward estimated dividend yield forecast in 2021 are also shown in the table based on Yahoo Finance website.
SHARE PRICE
PetroChina ticks the box as the best performer with 38% share price increase since the period of Covid-low. Exxon and Shell also show impressive share prices’ increase of 23-24%. CNOOC is the worst performer with a negative 6% share price change. This is likely due to the sanction CNOOC received.
Sinopec and Chevron see decent increase of share price being 9% and 7% respectively.
DIVIDEND
In 2020, Sinopec and CNOOC dished out the most lucrative dividends at 8% yield based on 3 May 2020 share prices.
In terms of 2021 YTD dividends declared so far, Sinopec remains winner with more than 8% yield. PetroChina comes in second at 7.5% yield. Both Sinopec and PetroChina are expected to enjoy ~8.9% of dividend yield in the whole of 2021.
In summary, Chinese oil companies paid out more dividends than US oil companies.
Note also that the table does not consider the withholding tax applicable on the dividends. As far as my experience of owning XOM.NYSE and Sinopec 386.HKSE, it is 30% and 10% on dividends respectively. Please do your own check.
Note also that PetroChina and Sinopec have the yet to expire Ex-Dividend date on 9 Sep 2021. Share prices are expected to drop after ExD date, unless positive news are expected.
OVERALL WINNER
Based on share prices and dividends pay out, it seems like PetroChina is the winner with highest capital appreciation and forecasted dividend yield in 2021.
Sinopec is the best dividend performer thus far.
Which is your preferred Oil & Gas counter?
PS: I own shares of Sinopec 386 at the time of writing.
This article does not take into consideration the fundamentals of the companies concerned. It is mainly a comparison of share prices and dividends of these six O&G counters from 3 May 2020 to 3 Sep 2021 and forecast 2021.
This article is also by no means a recommendation of which stocks to purchase. Refer to disclaimer on this website, please.