They Know the Drill

Investors have been betting that low oil prices are here to stay, expecting that record-high crude inventories are only going to grow from here. The problem seems to be particularly acute here in the U.S., where inventories are currently at their highest level in nearly eight decades according to publicly available data. With high inventories and slow global growth, traders recently pushing oil futures down to six-year lows thanks to their bearish bets.

Not only has oil performed poorly since about the middle of 2014, the energy sector as a whole has plummeted over the past year. Data from Fidelity Investments shows that the energy sector as a whole has plunged 12.9% over the trailing year, making it the single worst-performing sector as the S&P 500 has gained 11.6% over the same period.

While the sell-off has been relatively swift, it has created a lot of bargains among energy-related companies which aren’t all universally tied to the price of crude oil.

For instance, Noble Corp. (NYSE: NE) operates a fleet of about 34 offshore rigs designed to search for, drill and extract oil and natural has in ultra-deep-water environments. Considering that involves finding and pumping oil and gas from beneath tens of thousands of feet of seawater and earth, deep-water drilling is a pretty expensive proposition. So when oil prices plunge and oil companies cut their capital expenditures, deep-water drilling often gets sunk.

Since Noble is a contract driller, its share price has more than halved over the trailing year as investors have sold it off with the rest of the energy sector. But Noble as a company is actually weathering the recent oil storm quite well because, while I wouldn’t go so far as to say management foresaw the difficulties, it is a lean, mean, drilling machine.

Last year, the company spun-off its standard capability drilling rigs into Paragon Offshore (NYSE: PGN), keeping its most advanced rigs for itself. That move left it with one of the youngest and most technologically-capable fleets in the business. Noble had also been slowing down its rig construction program, with few deliveries scheduled over the next two years.

As a result, when Noble released its most recent fleet status report earlier this month, while it hadn’t won any new contracts or signed any contract extensions, it also hadn’t had any contracts terminated or terms renegotiated. Of its 34 of 34 vessels, no drill ships were available with only a handful of semi-submersibles and jack-ups idled thanks to its long-term contracts.

Right now, the company is still on a backlog of work valued at $10.1 billion, which should provide about $3 billion in revenue in 2015 alone. As a result, its current dividend of 38 cents – for a current yield of 10.9% — should be safe. That’s especially true since management said in December that it planned to sustain its dividend through this “industry pause.” It also expanded its share-repurchase program to 37 million shares, or about 15% of its current shares outstanding.

Between the dividend and the share buybacks, that should provide support for Noble’s shares at their current valuation, which also happens to be quite cheap. It’s currently trading at just 8.4 times its forward earnings estimate, well below its 5-year average of 14.7 times. That’s pretty favorable, considering analysts predict earnings per share of $2.39 in 2015.

The company is also sitting on a somewhat diminished, though still sizable, cash hoard of $114 million and has relatively little debt compared to the industry average.

None of this is to say there’s no risk to owning Noble. Even as well positioned as it is, if energy prices were to remain at current levels for another year or so, it could run into trouble. That isn’t a likely scenario though, so Noble should be close to a bottom.

It’s only one of dozens of stocks covered in Personal Finance, which uses its proprietary IDEAL system to identify companies with growing cash flows and dividends, which are trading at favorable valuations.

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