Chevron Corp.'s reign as a favored energy stock by the investment community is being challenged, as the oil industry continues to navigate the difficult market conditions brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Known for its capital discipline, Chevron headed into the epic oil price crash with one of the strongest balance sheets and credit metric profiles across the integrated oil and gas sector. But many analysts are turning more bearish, suggesting the company's solid valuation compared to most of its peers has little potential for more growth right now in light of the residing economic uncertainty.
Although positioned as the "safe haven" in the energy sector, "the current premium valuation, which is at multi-year highs, leaves limited room for further outperformance," RBC Capital Markets' analyst Biraj Borkhataria wrote in a June 10 research note to clients.
The investment bank downgraded Chevron from perform to underperform but maintained a 12-month share price target of $100.
On June 11, Chevron shares on the NYSE closed at $89.37, down 8.4% on the session, which was in step with the day's decline in the broader equities market. The S&P 500 Index ended nearly 6% lower on June 11 as worries of a second wave of COVID-19 and a dismal economic and employment outlook from the government pushed the stock markets to their largest losses since mid-March.
CFRA also recently downgraded Chevron, from buy to hold, and has a 12-month price target at $98 per share.
"Given the depths of the carnage in oil markets, we think the near term is about survival, and Chevron's strong balance sheet entering 2020 is a key advantage. Nonetheless, we see little reason to get too excited over Chevron's prospects given relatively rich valuation (at least compared to forward earnings and cash flow prospects)," CFRA analyst Stewart Glickman wrote in a June 6 report.
Although reiterating its market perform rating on Chevron, CreditSights said in a June 4 report it is concerned about the company's ability to pay shareholder dividends, which are pegged at $15 billion to $16 billion each year, from 2019 through 2024.
In addition, considering Chevron's low refinery capacity and its lower upstream production than its peers, an "outperform is not warranted," CreditSights wrote.
However, other analysts remain more bullish on Chevron. Goldman Sachs recently raised its 12-month price target for the company from $105 to $112 per share and maintained a buy rating. Evercore ISI analysts are holding Chevron at outperform, but at $98 per share, their 12-month price target is significantly lower than Goldman Sachs'.
California-based Chevron, like its peers, is grappling with the market fallout from the recent oil price crisis. Apart from halting its buyback program, Chevron plans to slash 2020 capital expenditures by about 30% to as low as $14 billion and will reduce cash capital and exploratory spending by $3.3 billion, to $10.5 billion. Chevron also has throttled back upstream production at operations around the world.
Additionally, Chevron will lay off 10% to 15% of its global workers this year, or anywhere from 4,500 to 6,750 employees. Chevron has almost 45,000 employees across the globe, about 50% of which are in the U.S.