Key Takeaways
- ExxonMobil stock rose 12% in the past month and Chevron rose 11% as attacks in the Middle East pushed Brent crude above $100 a barrel. The S&P 500 was flat over the same stretch.
- Exxon’s third-quarter preview shows higher refining margins adding $4.5 billion against the second quarter, far more than the $1.3 billion hit from lower oil prices.
- Analysts expect Exxon’s earnings to shrink after 2026, and the consensus price target sits right around the share price ahead of results on Oct. 30.
ExxonMobil (XOM) stock is up 12% in the past month, and Chevron (CVX) is up 11%. The S&P 500 went basically nowhere.
Obviously a lot of that price action is tied to the war in the Middle East, which pushed Brent crude back above $100 a barrel. But Exxon’s own preview of its third quarter shows refining doing the heavy lifting, while crude actually worked against it.
What exactly happened
Four sessions made up nearly three-quarters of Exxon’s gain:
- Oct. 8 (+2.7%): A tanker attack in the Persian Gulf disrupted traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, and hurricanes shut in output in the Gulf of Mexico, pushing Brent above $104.
- Oct. 12 (+1.9%): Oil climbed after deadly attacks on a Saudi airport.
- Oct. 14 (+1.7%): Iran-backed Houthis hit targets across Saudi Arabia, including Saudi Aramco’s headquarters.
- Oct. 16 (+2.5%): Exxon’s preview of what’s moving its third-quarter earnings hit the news before the open.
That takes Exxon’s gain in 2026 to 48% (through Wednesday’s close), and the stock sits near its 52-week high.
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Refining is doing the heavy lifting
Exxon’s preview sets the third quarter against the second, when it earned $14.7 billion on an adjusted basis.
Lower oil prices should take $1.3 billion off its upstream earnings. But higher refining margins should add $4.5 billion in its energy products business, plus $0.5 billion in specialty products. (Exxon is clear that this isn’t an earnings forecast: it leaves out operating performance, among other things.)
My read is that those margins owe a lot to the war too. When fuel stops flowing freely out of the Gulf, refiners elsewhere get paid more for what they make. So if the region calms down, Exxon could lose both tailwinds at once.
Jim Cramer, host of CNBC’s Mad Money, put the downside bluntly on X: if the war ends on terms the US is happy with, “oil goes to the fifties.”
Priced for $100 oil
Exxon trades at 12x forward earnings, a touch below its five-year average of 13x…
ExxonMobil Holdings (XOM): forward (NTM) P/E, last 5 years (TIKR)
But the earnings under that multiple are unusually high. Analysts expect Exxon to earn $13.28 a share in 2026, nearly double the $6.99 it earned in 2025, and then slide to $10.61 by 2028…
ExxonMobil Holdings (XOM): normalized EPS, actual and consensus estimates, $ per share, fiscal 2024–2029 (TIKR)
So the Street already sees 2026 as the peak.
Analysts have still chased the stock higher. Since Oct. 15, Barclays has raised its target to $200, JPMorgan to $186 and Morgan Stanley to $185, while BofA lifted its own to $181 and kept a Neutral rating. The consensus target has climbed from $126 a year ago to $179…
ExxonMobil Holdings (XOM): analysts’ consensus (mean) price target, $ per share, last year (TIKR)
That’s right around where the stock closed on Wednesday, with targets ranging from $142 to $206.
Hold, and watch Oct. 30
My take: I’d hold Exxon here rather than take profits or buy more. The business is earning a fortune and the multiple isn’t stretched. But buying at this price is a bet that the war premium lasts, and the Street’s own estimates say it won’t.
The same bet applies to Chevron, which rode the same oil move. Cramer prefers it: “I think Exxon’s good. I think Chevron’s better,” he said on Mad Money on Oct. 15.
Exxon reports third-quarter results on Friday, Oct. 30. The thing to watch is whether the refining boost shows up as the preview says, and what management says about margins heading into the fourth quarter.
Of course, if the attacks keep coming and Brent holds above $100 well into 2027, those later estimates have room to rise, and the stock with them.
So what is ExxonMobil stock actually worth?
TIKR lets you forecast the future price of any stock in less than a minute. Just enter a few assumptions into TIKR’s valuation model and see what ExxonMobil could be worth. Start from Wall Street consensus estimates, or adjust the inputs to reflect your own view of the business. It’s free to use.
Disclaimer:
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