Alamo

Exxon Mobil Is a Buy

What XOM has done over the past 20-50 years is make a bundle of money and use it to make more. That is historical. Today, they are continuing to champion a resource that is quickly disappearing regardless of what their vast propoganda machine spiel sets forth.

XOM's proven reserves are decreasing at around 5 percent annually over the past 3 years and it is doubtful that that trend will not continue. What does their future hold in 15-20 years? Presently, their "strategic" thinking seems to be chasing around the far corners of the globe looking for increasingly difficult to find reserves and cutting deals with increasingly difficult to "negotiate with" foreign government bureaucrats. Both endeavors---finding reserves and then "enticing concessions from the controlling powers" is very expensive as well as extremely risky.

A far less risky and less expensive course would be to scrap XOM's wild goose approach and concentrate their money and energy toward buying a Chesapeake or XTO or other principle player in the domestic natural gas exploration and production game. At this time when low natural gas prices have depressed market caps throughout the E and P sector, when the US begins driving on CNG the value of those principle-player companies will quickly double at least.

Regardless, XOM's future is bleak if it continues its current direction. Are there any XOM share holders reading SA?