BP (BP) produces roughly 3.8 million barrels of oil daily. It currently has 22,400 service stations around the planet. Its main division is BP America. It is actually the largest producer of oil and gas in America, and it is headquartered in Houston. The company currently holds roughly 18.07 billion barrels worth of reserves, much of which is in the Gulf of Mexico.

Valuation

I would recommend this company as an investment. One of the reasons is that the firm has a P/E ratio of 5.08. This number is lower than all its main competitors. In fact, the 2nd place company, Chevron (CVX) has a ratio of 7.52.

Not only that, but the price to sales ratio is .33. This again is significantly better than its major competitors.

Two of the biggest competitors, Exxon Mobil (XOM) and Chevron, have ratios of .87 and .86, respectively. These are nearly three times as high. Two of the others, Total (TOT) and Royal Dutch Shell (RDS.A), have rates of .46 and .43. However, BP only has a 6.33% profit margin, which is quite low. In fact, the only competitor with a worse profit margin is ConocoPhillips (COP), who has a rate of 5.25%. BP has $235 billion in revenue, with a gross profit of $65.75 billion. However, it does have $4 billion in cash and $32.5 billion in debt.

The company gave out a dividend of $3.63 billion in 2011. This was roughly 4.5% of the firm’s market capitalization. BP has been known as one of the top dividend producing stocks for quite some time, and it continued this reputation last year.To continue reading, click here.