[ET Net News Agency, 28 February 2020] Morgan Stanley lowered its target price for
CNOOC (00883) to HK$14.9 from HK$16.55 and maintained its "overweight" rating.
The research house said CNOOC remains its top pick among the Big Three oil majors as its
"back-to-growth" strategy unfolds. Morgan remains positive on this strategy and expects
the company's superior growth to become the key re-rating catalyst. Thanks to its pure
upstream exposure, Morgan thinks CNOOC has the least downside risk to Covid-19.
Despite a lower crude oil price outlook, Morgan believes the Chinese government's 7-year
action plan on oil production will continue and CNOOC will maintain its strategy to
increase production with reasonable capex expansion. Given the company's guidance, it sees
the stock continuing to outperform its peers if the company can maintain good cost control
while delivering higher production growth in 2020. (KL)