Topic: How To Invest

IMPERIAL OIL $51.49 – Toronto symbol IMO

IMPERIAL OIL $51.49 (Toronto symbol IMO; Shares outstanding: 847.6 million; Market cap: $43.6 billion; TSINetwork Rating: Average; Dividend yield: 0.9%; www.imperialoil.ca) is Canada’s largest integrated oil company.

Imperial earned $0.95 a share in the three months ended December 31, 2010. That’s up 50.8%, from $0.63 a share a year earlier. The rise was mainly the result of higher oil and gas prices, and improved profits at Imperial’s refineries. Revenue rose 18.2%, to $6.9 billion from $5.9 billion.

The company’s production is set to rise in the long term, thanks to its new oil-sands projects, including the $8-billion Kearl project, which is more than 50% complete. When it starts operating in 2012, Kearl should add 78,100 barrels of oil to Imperial’s daily production of 294,000 barrels. Imperial owns 71% of Kearl. ExxonMobil Corp. (New York symbol XOM) owns the remaining 29%. Exxon also holds a 69.6% interest in Imperial.

Imperial spent $4.0 billion on capital upgrades in 2010. The company expects to spend between $4.0 billion and $4.5 billion on capital projects in 2011. Most of these funds will go toward Kearl.

Imperial Oil is still a safety-conscious buy.

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