When to buy BP?

[Meadbh]

With a safety record like this, I wouldn't be investing in BP anytime soon.

BP: The Mother of all Egregious Violators | Credit Writedowns

 

[ronocnikral]

while marveling at bp's crazy volume today, a thought popped in my head...sell your 600 shares of CVX...this could have been anyone.

my hope is the dividend continues, most likely in a reduced amount.

and i agree with ha. and add a lot of political uncertainty with extreme amounts of risk.

 

[frayne]

Exxon had the Valdez disaster, Union Carbide had Bhopal, and now BP has this GOM major eco damaging event. I would bet, a year from now BP stock will be back in the 60-70 dollar range. They may have some PR issues but you can bet they are working this problem hard in order to come to some form of resolution. It is too bad politics have entered into the equation and the Obama administration feels the need to keep their boot on the neck of BP. BP could have said, screw it and paid the $75 million cap and simply walked away. They are trying to do the right thing and getting beat up at every turn. The 24/7 press is feeding on this story like a shark that senses blood in the water. There is very little fair, balanced and objective reporting on this horrible accident and eco event. When all said is done, I think BP will be shown in a better light than the treatment they are currently receiving.

IMHO Tony Hayward was not the right man for the CEO job at this point in time and would have been better off keeping his mouth shut, the board has to be on pins and needles knowing Tony is going in front of congress next week. He won't be the CEO for long.

 

[haha]

It is too bad politics have entered into the equation and the Obama administration feels the need to keep their boot on the neck of BP. BP could have said, screw it and paid the $75 million cap and simply walked away. They are trying to do the right thing and getting beat up at every turn. The 24/7 press is feeding on this story like a shark that senses blood in the water. There is very little fair, balanced and objective reporting on this horrible accident and eco event. When all said is done, I think BP will be shown in a better light than the treatment they are currently receiving.

Along this line:
FT.com / Companies / Oil & Gas - Obama’s BP attacks spark worries in UK

 

[Gone4Good]

Poor, poor, BP. The politicians are saying such mean things.

 

[Snidely Whiplash]

Exxon had the Valdez disaster, Union Carbide had Bhopal, and now BP has this GOM major eco damaging event. I would bet, a year from now BP stock will be back in the 60-70 dollar range. They may have some PR issues but you can bet they are working this problem hard in order to come to some form of resolution. It is too bad politics have entered into the equation and the Obama administration feels the need to keep their boot on the neck of BP. BP could have said, screw it and paid the $75 million cap and simply walked away. They are trying to do the right thing and getting beat up at every turn. The 24/7 press is feeding on this story like a shark that senses blood in the water. There is very little fair, balanced and objective reporting on this horrible accident and eco event. When all said is done, I think BP will be shown in a better light than the treatment they are currently receiving.

I agree completely, although I think $60 to $70 in about a year may be somewhat optimistic.

That being said, the negativity was pretty heavy yesterday ref: dividend cuts and a possible bankruptcy and BP volume was extremely high on the NYSE yesterday, I suspect that some level of capitulation took place. I took a chance on a small position below $30 per share. But I fully recognize it is more of a gamble than an investment at this point.



PS - I still dont see many cars at their gas stations.

 

[Trek]

BP is too big to fail.

 

[Zathras]

Below $30 per share today. Is now the time to buy?

I would really like to make some money on a stock that has been unfairly beaten down. I need someone to tell me some good things about BP so that I can get on the band wagon.
They bought ARCO years ago. This was a good thing for many reasons. This is why I owned it once upon a time. Now I look at this stock and I see the General Motors of the oil industry.

Free to canoe

Calling BP the GM of the oil industry might make a very strong argument against buying their stock. GM stockholders lost all of their investments, didn't they?

 

[haha]

BP is too big to fail.

Exactly! Along the lines of the Penn Central.

Ha

 

[frayne]

Would be awful funny if BP would be taken over by some Chinese oil company.

If this incident was caused by some American company like Exxon, I think the press as well as the administration would be taking a much different tone.

 

[ronocnikral]

What about APC? Taken a hit with the Horizon mess, but out of the spotlight...I'm not sure what voodoo analyzing magic one does, but it seems better than BP if one is worried about a PR nightmare...

 

[ESRwannabe]

Would be awful funny if BP would be taken over by some Chinese oil company.

If this incident was caused by some American company like Exxon, I think the press as well as the administration would be taking a much different tone.

I agree. The reaction has been extremely counterproductive.

Let's just run all the oil companies out of business. So, we can get all of our oil from OPEC, Venezuela, and Russia. Sounds like a good plan...

 

[ronocnikral]

I agree. The reaction has been extremely counterproductive.

Let's just run all the oil companies out of business. So, we can get all of our oil from OPEC, Venezuela, and Russia. Sounds like a good plan...

just an interesting note of history, the idea of OPEC was conceived by a venzuelan while in exile in the US.

 

[IndependentlyPoor]

Interesting comments
10 Thoughts for Those Buying (or Selling) BP… | The Big Picture

 

[FinanceDude]

I would NOT buy BP, considering the majority party in power. BP is on notice that the witch trials are about to start.............huge fines and punitive damage legislation will be forthcoming....how else are we going to get to $7.00/gallon for gas so the alternative energy cars with high subsidies become mainstream??

 

[HFWR]

I would NOT buy BP, considering the majority party in power. BP is on notice that the witch trials are about to start.............huge fines and punitive damage legislation will be forthcoming....how else are we going to get to $7.00/gallon for gas so the alternative energy cars with high subsidies become mainstream??

I heard a talking head saying that reinstating the moratoreum would result in $5/gal gasoline. This seemed silly to me, since the moratoreum had just only been lifted, and likely no deepwater wells even started yet...

 

[nnkrealtor]

So... did anyone take the plunge and invest in BP? Either with stock or options...

 

[Free To Canoe]

So... did anyone take the plunge and invest in BP? Either with stock or options...

I was all talk and no action. BP is about $38 today. I guess the shareholders liked it that Tony Hayward was replaced.

Free to canoe

 

[ERD50]

So... did anyone take the plunge and invest in BP? Either with stock or options...

Yes to both. I think I posted it here somewhere, but I'll re-iterate/update. BTC = Buy to Close; STO = Sell to Open.

I bought BP too soon, $37.83 on 6/4. Sold calls June 40's @ $1.35, bought them back @ $.15 to roll them out to JULY 38's @ $1.65 as the stock dropped (I'd be left with a profit if assigned). Rolled out and down again for AUG; BTC the July 38s @ 0.10 and STO AUG 36s for 0.94.

So ignoring comms for now, that takes my effective cost basis down to $34.14, so if I get called out at 36, I'll make a nice profit for the time frame (5% for 2-3 months), but not a killing. If it's near 36 at expiry and the premiums are still high, I may roll out again.

-ERD50

 

[dgoldenz]

I bought in at $32/share, then again at $29/share, then again at $34/share. Currently at ~$38/share. Could be choppy for the next few months but it all blows over eventually. Their revenue was still up over last year and the price per barrel of oil was up ~$20/barrel over the same period last year. They should also start paying dividends again next year.

Also bought in on RIG at $45/share and ATP at $9/share.

 

[clifp]

So... did anyone take the plunge and invest in BP? Either with stock or options...

Back in May when BP was trading in the high 40s, I wrote a long term put on BP for $35 a share that expires in Jan of 2011. I figured by that time most of the uncertainty regarding the spill would be resolved. I initially looked at the web estimate for the clean up cost and figured in the 10 billion range, I doubled it to $20 billion. Of course this turned out to be widely optimistic with them taking a $32 billion charge this quarter and some estimate calling for it to double.

Still before the oil spill BP had a market cap of $210 billion at $35 strike price it will be 110 billion so Mr. Market has punished BP for an amount well in excess of the spill cost. On the other hand, I in hindsight I wrote the puts much too cheaply.