The last few weeks with oil stock Petrobras (NYSE:PBR) have featured a wide array of incidents where the Brazilian government stepped in to lend a hand to its hometown boy and help get oil inventories shored up. Yet, a new move might leave the Brazilian government wondering why it bothered, and Petrobras investors concerned, as its shares fell somewhat in Friday afternoon’s trading.
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Basically, Petrobras took a look at the world’s situation—particularly in light of the Israel-Hamas war—and decided to shift some pricing around. While it’s cutting the price of gasoline sold to its distributors, it’s also planning to hike prices on diesel fuel. This was done, reports note, to fend off the effects of Russian diesel in the Brazilian market. Petrobras hiked diesel prices by 6.6% but dropped gasoline prices by 4.1%. With seasonal demand for gasoline approaching its lowest ebb and diesel not only holding static but also likely to see a seasonal hike, the plan made at least some sense.
Meanwhile, this news comes at a time when Petrobras is pulling out more raw product than it’s done in quite some time. Reports noted that Petrobras’ third quarter figures for crude oil and natural gas together came out to be around 3.98 million barrels per day, roughly. That represents around an 8% jump against the third quarter of 2022. Based on Petrobras’ figures for August and September, it saw a total utilization factor of 95.8. That’s the highest that rate has been since 2014, which is impressive by any standard.
Is PBR a Good Stock to Buy?
Turning to Wall Street, analysts have a Moderate Buy consensus rating on PBR stock based on five Buys and three Holds assigned in the past three months, as indicated by the graphic below. Furthermore, the average PBR price target of $16.46 per share implies 1.51% upside potential.
