Key Takeaways
- American Assets Investment Management manages $5.87 billion. It has a ExxonMobil (XOM) stake of 410,000 shares, worth $67 million by Sept. 30, which makes it the fund’s fourth-largest US stock holding.
- Analysts expect ExxonMobil’s normalized EPS to peak in 2026 and fall through 2028 as the windfall from the Middle East disruption fades.
- ExxonMobil trades at about 12x forward earnings, a bit below its five-year average, while it raises its dividend and plans $20 billion of buybacks in 2027.
- The fund looks right to own it: even analysts’ lower 2028 estimate is well above what ExxonMobil earned in 2025.
A fund you’ve probably never heard of has ExxonMobil (XOM) as one of its biggest bets, right as oil’s war premium starts to slip.
American Assets Investment Management filed its 13F for the quarter ended Sept. 30 on Oct. 30. It shows a position of 410,000 ExxonMobil shares, worth $67 million at quarter-end prices.
A new stake, straight into the top five
American Assets manages $5.87 billion in all, according to its latest Form ADV.
Its 13F lists $1.62 billion of US stocks across 137 positions. At around 4% of those 13F stocks, ExxonMobil is its fourth-largest holding.
A 13F only shows what a fund held on the quarter’s last day, so it can’t tell us what American Assets paid or why it bought. What we can see is the stock.
It’s up 1% from its Sept. 30 price to Thursday’s close of $165.24, and it’s 13% below its 52-week high. So anyone following the fund in today pays close to the quarter-end price the filing shows.
TIKR tracks 27 analysts on Exxon Mobil. How many say “Buy”?
See the full breakdown of Buy, Hold, and Sell ratings on Exxon Mobil, along with Wall Street’s revenue and earnings estimates, all in one place. More than 500,000 investors use TIKR to research stocks like this one. See Exxon Mobil’s Analyst Ratings
2026 looks like the peak
ExxonMobil’s Q2 earnings doubled to $14.5 billion, from $7.1 billion a year earlier, as the Strait of Hormuz disruption lifted crude prices and refining margins.
The company kept it going in Q3, reported Oct. 30. Adjusted EPS of $4.23 beat the $4.13 Bloomberg consensus, helped by the refining lift it had flagged ahead of the report, while weaker oil prices held it back.
Analysts expect 2026 to be the peak year, with normalized EPS falling in 2027 and again in 2028:
Consensus falls from $13.63 a share in 2026 to $10.45 in 2028, and analysts have been trimming the out-years even as they raised 2026.
But that 2028 figure is still well above the $6.99 ExxonMobil earned in 2025, when Brent averaged $69.06 a barrel.
And I’d expect analysts to trim those out-years again. Brent fell 8% on Nov. 2 after Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said the supreme leader had authorized peace talks.
An ordinary multiple on peak-year earnings
ExxonMobil’s forward P/E is right around its five-year average:
It was 13x on Nov. 2, in line with its 13x average, and about 12x at Thursday’s close.
That’s a long way above the 6.6x investors paid in July 2022, the last time high oil prices sent ExxonMobil’s earnings soaring.
So ExxonMobil isn’t priced as if the windfall lasts. If you divide today’s price by analysts’ 2028 estimate, though, you get a multiple well above that 13x average.
Wall Street’s average target has climbed with the earnings over the past year:
TIKR’s consensus target rose from $127 a year ago to $183 on Nov. 2, above the last close. Individual targets run from $142 to $213.
Paid to wait
What I like most is what ExxonMobil does with the cash. On Oct. 30, it raised its quarterly dividend to $1.07, its 44th straight annual increase.
It also said it plans $20 billion of buybacks in 2027, assuming reasonable market conditions. Net debt fell by more than $9 billion in Q3.
CEO Darren Woods was asked about $60 oil. He said the balance sheet would supplement payouts at the bottom of the cycle, and that the company is “not going to ever cut our dividend.”
The risk is a fast peace: PIMCO CEO Manny Roman said on Bloomberg that a full peace treaty, with gas moving freely, would leave oil 40% lower after three months.
And ExxonMobil’s U.S. Upstream business, home of the Permian, earned just a 4.3% return on $118.1 billion of average capital employed in 2025.
Still, I think American Assets made a good call in holding this stock. At about 12x, you’re buying a company whose earnings stay well above 2025’s level, even on analysts’ lowered numbers.
Meanwhile, its dividend and buybacks pay you while you wait to see if the 2030 plan delivers.
ExxonMobil is skipping its usual December plan event this year. The next check is a press release later this quarter that will reaffirm its 2027 targets, then its Q4 call in late January.
The fund’s next 13F, due in mid-February, will show whether it’s still holding.
So what is ExxonMobil stock actually worth?
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Disclaimer:
Please note that the articles on TIKR are not intended to serve as investment or financial advice from TIKR or our content team, nor are they recommendations to buy or sell any stocks. We create our content based on TIKR Terminal’s investment data and analysts’ estimates. Our analysis might not include recent company news or important updates. TIKR has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. Thank you for reading, and happy investing!
