Halliburton Could Rally FurtherMary Crane, 04.21.06, 12:15 PM ET
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RBC analyst Kurt Hallead maintained his “outperform” rating and price target of $88 on Halliburton stock after the company reported strong first-quarter net income of $488 million.
Dave Lesar, Halliburton’s chief executive officer, attributed his company’s first-quarter growth largely to “another record quarter” for Halliburton’s Energy Services Group (ESG). Its revenue increased 35% year-over-year, reflecting ESG’s increased rig activity, higher asset utilization and increased pricing.
Less profitable was Halliburton’s subsidiary, Kellogg Brown & Root (KBR), which provides various services mainly to militaries and governments. Its first-quarter revenue dropped 13% year-over-year, due mainly to decreased military support activities in Iraq, management reported.
Halliburton (nyse: HAL - news - people ) netted $1.1 billion in revenue in the first quarter from its Iraq-related work. Last year, the company was the largest contractor by awards employed by the U.S. Army.
Overall, Halliburton, which provides products and services to the petroleum and energy industries, has watched its stock rally 25% off a March low.
Hallead was bullish on Halliburton shares and said they would rally further, given the company’s positive first-quarter gains, its upside driven by ESG earnings, and strong incremental margins, especially in North America.
“We recommend aggressive purchase at current levels,” Hallead wrote in Friday’s research note to investors.
Earnings-per-share momentum should continue and the valuation gap relative to its peers should continue to narrow, Hallead forecasted. Halliburton’s planned 30% divestiture of its KBR assets by the end of the second quarter should also generate a pre-tax gain of around $100 million.
Hallead said Halliburton’s results were due more to the commodity price/group dynamic than earnings expectations.
That’s good news for similar energy services companies like Schlumberger (nyse: SLB - news - people ) and Baker Hughes (nyse: BHI - news - people ), as well as oil pressure-pumping companies like BJ Services (nyse: BJS - news - people ) and Superior Well Services (nasdaq: SWSI - news - people ).Take teh Best!!