Let's say you took a data base of ALL publicly listed companies in the US. And then ranked them according to profit margins, highest to lowest. All publicly listed companies. And then wrote a story in a national investors newspaper/journal featuring five or six. And that newspaper/journal does not target any specific industry. What would you expect to find? Certainly not this:
High oil prices hurt at the gas pump. But they help at the wellhead pump. That has boosted profit margins at Continental Resources the largest landholder in the Bakken Shale oil and gas play in parts of North Dakota, Montana and Canada.Of ALL the publicly traded companies in the US, NOG comes in at number 3. I remember a lot of hoopla about this company some months ago. Number 3.
Continental generated almost 63 cents of profit for every dollar of sales last year, topping IBD's Screen of the Day for Monday, which ranks firms by that key metric.
Northern Oil & Gas, another Bakken Shale play, also ranked high, with 58.1%.
Credit card processor Visa ranked second, at a 60.2% annual margin, with MasterCard is a few rungs lower, with a profit margin just under 50%.
And CLR #1.
Incredible.
