Refinery upgrades should spur earnings

Article Excerpt

CENOVUS ENERGY INC. $32 (Toronto symbol CVE; Conservative Growth Portfolio, Resources sector; Shares outstanding: 752.0 million; Market cap: $24.1 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.8; Dividend yield: 2.5%; TSINetwork Rating: Extra Risk; www.cenovus.com) earned $0.21 a share in the quarter ended September 30, 2010, down 63.2% from $0.57 a year earlier. Cash flow per share fell 44.7%, to $0.68 from $1.23. Lower natural-gas production and prices were the main reasons for the declines. Unplanned outages at two refineries in the U.S. Midwest also hurt the company’s results; Cenovus and ConocoPhillips (New York symbol COP) each own 50% of these refineries. However, the partners are expanding the refinery in Illinois. That should make this facility more profitable, starting in late 2011. Cenovus is a buy. buy…