SM: Wells Fargo upgrades to Overweight, lifts PT to $47
Wells Fargo upgrades SM to Overweight from Equal Weight and raises its price target to $47 from $32, citing NAV discount easing and well cost/activity assumption changes including Uinta.
SM Wells Fargo Upgrades SM to Overweight from Equal Weight, Raises PT to $47 from $32 Analyst comments: "Our new $47 price target is based on NAV, rising from our prior $32 valuation due to 1) easing of the applied NAV discount; 2) well cost adjustments in Uinta, Midland, and DJ; and 3) activity assumption changes, particularly in the Uinta, with NAV accretion due to higher front-loaded oil weighting on a corporate level.
For 2027, we estimate 319 TILs across SM's multi-basin position, yielding ~3% exit-rate oil production growth in 4Q27 at ~$2.8B capex.
On the conference call, management noted ongoing progress in well cost and CIVI merger synergies.
Importantly, we have not modeled any improvement in type curves/well productivity in any basin from current FY26 leading edge, even though it remains early days in the CIVI merger and ongoing learning could yield productivity enhancement in 2027.
As stated above, we view SM as highly competitive within the group on the most critical performance factors: upside to NAV and 2027 FCF/EV." Analyst: Sam Margolin