PASON SYSTEMS $30.37 (Toronto symbol PSI; TSINetwork Rating: Speculative) (403-301-3400; www.pason.com; Shares outstanding: 82.4 million; Market cap: $2.5 billion; Dividend yield: 2.0%) is trading near all-time highs as it continues to gain from the boom in U.S. shale oil and gas drilling.
Pason rents equipment for monitoring and managing oil and gas rigs. It also sells communication technology, such as its satellite system, which companies use to remotely collect data from their drilling operations. Pason serves oil and gas producers and drilling contractors throughout Canada, the U.S., Mexico, Argentina and Australia.
In the three months ended March 31, 2014, the company’s revenue rose 12.7%, to $123.2 million from $109.3 million a year earlier. Higher sales in the U.S., Australia and Canada offset slower drilling activity in Mexico and a significant devaluation of the Argentine currency.
Cash flow per share rose 11.5%, to $0.68 from $0.61. Pason holds cash of $116.8 million, or $1.42 a share, and has no debt.
The company raised its quarterly dividend by 7.1% with the April 2014 payment, to $0.15 from $0.14. The shares now yield 2.0%.
The outlook for North American drilling remains strong, despite normal fluctuations in oil and gas prices and lobbying by environmental groups to limit the fracturing of shale rock (or using sand pumped at high pressure to collapse the rock and bring oil to the surface).
Pason Systems is still a buy.
