PetroChina Company, Ltd. (PTR) reported high growth revenue in 2007 due to high crude oil price. However, its earnings in 2007 showed almost no growth over 2006 due to increased special earnings levies and government price control of refined products. In 2007, its turnover reached RMB 835.04 billion, representing an increase of 21.2% from the previous year.
Its total oil and gas output reached an aggregate of 1.11 billion barrels of oil equivalent, representing an increase of 4.8% from 2006. Crude oil output reached 839 million barrels, representing an increase of 1% from the previous year. Output of marketable natural gas reached 1.63 trillion cubic feet, representing a growth of 18.6% from the previous year.
Although PetroChina faces a number of challenges in executing this strategy, including high asset prices due to continued strength in commodity prices and intense global competition for upstream assets, the company is well positioned to leverage the tremendous opportunities in China's market.
Thus, we maintain our Hold rating for PetroChina. Based on our estimate for fiscal year 2008 earnings per ADR, the company is trading at 9.7x, which is similar to industry mean. Based on our estimate for fiscal year 2009 earnings per ADR, the company is trading at 9.3x, which is still similar to industry mean. We believe current valuation fairly represents its justified value. Using a P/E multiple of 9.8x our fiscal year 2009 earnings per ADR estimate yields a target price of $128.75, which we believe reflects the company's prospects.
Read the full analyst report on PTR.
Get real-time market insights and profitable stock recommendations from the team of analysts at Zacks Equity Research. See all todays Analyst Blog entries on Zacks.com.