For most shares in the FTSE 100, 2013 was a good year and investors have likely enjoyed capital gains and rising dividend income.
That makes me nervous about investing for 2014 and beyond, and I’m going to work hard to adhere to the first tenet of money management: preserve capital.
To help me avoid losses whilst pursuing gains, I’m examining companies from three important angles:
- Prospects;
- Risks;
- Valuation.
Today, I’m looking at oil giant Royal Dutch Shell (LSE: RDSB) (NYSE: RDS-B.US).
Track record
With the shares at 2204p, Royal Dutch Shell’s market cap. is £54,464 million.
This table summarises the firm’s recent financial record:
| Year to December | 2008 | 2009 | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue ($m) | 458,361 | 278,188 | 368,056 | 470,171 | 467,153 |
| Net cash from operations ($m) | 43,918 | 21,488 | 27,350 | 36,771 | 46,140 |
| Adjusted earnings per share (cents) | 509 | 160 | 304 | 461 | 432 |
| Dividend per share (cents) | 160 | 168 | 168 | 168 | 172 |
1) Prospects
In a recent third-quarter update, Shell revealed a 5% decline in operating cash flow for the first nine months of its trading year. Headwinds from weak industry refining margins and the security situation in Nigeria didn’t help, and the firm expects those factors to further erode the near term outlook. However, the CEO reckons the company has a strong project flow in place for 2014 and beyond that will drive Shell’s cash flow in 2014 and beyond.
Shell’s growth agenda could see around 30 major projects add about seven billion barrels of oil, or gas equivalents. The company thinks that such upstream activity is capable of boosting cash flow by $15 billion before the end of 2015 if the oil price holds at about $100 per barrel.
The company sees the dividend as the main route for returning cash to shareholders and reckons it distributed more than $11 billion of dividends in the last year or so. There’s also an active share-repurchase programme designed to drive up earnings- and dividend-per-share figures with the firm targeting a $5 billion buyback spend in 2013.
2) Risks
At the risk of stating the obvious, Shell is a commodity-type business. By that I mean a business characterised by little pricing power and zero product differentiation. In other words, the firm’s profitability relies on the prevailing price of the commodity it sells into the market. That makes the firm particularly vulnerable to the supply and demand equation and I think we can see the effects of economic cyclicality in the table above.
If the price of oil falls, the expected cash-flow outcome may not materialise despite operational progress and that could jeopardise dividend returns for investors.
3) Valuation
A forward dividend yield of 5.2% for 2014 looks attractive. City analysts expect forward earnings to cover that dividend just over twice and you can pick up the shares on a forward P/E multiple of around nine, which sits well against 10% earnings-growth predictions.
What now?
Shell’s dividend looks attractive, but the potential for commodity prices to fall puts me off.
