< The 2015 All-America Research Team
Faisel Khan
Citi
First-Place Appearances: 3
Total Appearances: 10
Analyst Debut: 2006
For a second consecutive year, Faisel Khan of Citi merits first place. “He is great at understanding and explaining the major industry trends,” proclaims one ally. “He then does a good job of applying the big-picture trends to his stock picking.” Given the volatility of the industry and the headwind that is commodities prices, says Khan, project development backlogs are slowing down and stock prices have been cut in half. Indeed, by mid-September the NYSE Arca Natural Gas Index had shaved 42.9 percent off the all-time high it established in June 2014, compared with the near-flat performance by the S&P 500 over the same period. After downgrading stocks throughout most of last year and into 2015, the researcher began upgrading in July. “A lot of these assets are starting to screen cheap versus our valuation methodology,” he explains. Khan, 39, is optimistic that U.S. hydrocarbon subsectors will remain competitive against the rest of the world, including natural-gas liquids production that is being transported across the globe and requires more capacity to accommodate it. As a result, he is recommending that clients favor names with exposure to the NGLs export industry. “We think that’s where the cycle of investment continues to take place,” he advises. Philadelphia-based Sunoco Logistics Partners as well as Houston’s Enterprise Products Partners and Targa Resources Corp. are among his preferred players on this theme.
