Best Buy: Exxon Mobil, Chevron, or Royal Dutch Shell?

The plunge in oil prices that started in mid-2014 forced integrated oil and natural gas giants ExxonMobil Corporation (NYSE: XOM), Chevron Corporation (NYSE: CVX), and Royal Dutch Shell plc (NYSE: RDS-B) to retrench. Their financial results are finally starting to stabilize now that oil has been holding steadily in the $50-per-barrel range. However, they have been left with higher debt loads and a renewed outlook that includes range-bound oil prices for years to come. Which is the best buy today?

One of the hangovers from the deep oil downturn is debt. All of the oil majors added leverage to their balance sheets so they could keep paying their distributions and fund planned capital expenditures. At the midpoint of 2017, Exxon had $4 billion in cash, with debt making up roughly 12% of its capital structure. That's a rock-solid balance sheet, but it's even more impressive when you consider that Exxon's debt is over three times larger than what it was at the start of 2014.

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Source: Fool.com