Hurricane watch

With the 2009 hurricane season officially beginning this past week,  Sean Broderick offers four stock picks — two bullish, two bearish — to play this summer's potentially "wild weather."

In his Uncommon Wisdom advisory he offers one pair of picks that he believes will do well should the hurricane season turn out to be mild and a second pair of stocks that would see rising profits in the event that damaging storms hit in "Hurricane Alley."

"Last year's stormy weather spawned 16 named storms, which was higher than the long-term average of about 10 tropical storms and six hurricanes per year in a typical Atlantic hurricane season.

"The major hurricane forecasters have now made their predictions, and it's for a 'moderate' hurricane season. Cooler seas off the coast of Africa and a prediction of a weak El Nino get the credit for the calmer forecast.

"That's good news for America's oil and gas industry, which is still recovering from the carnage caused in Energy Alley last year by two hurricanes — Ike and Gustav.

"Unfortunately, the number of storms in any given year are notoriously unreliable. And the second piece of bad news: It only takes one well-aimed hurricane to make the season a bad one. So don't take the forecast for a 'moderate' season as a reason to slack off in your preparedness.

Advertisement

"And one well-placed hurricane could also cause major damage to Energy Alley, And should a hurricane line up to hammer Energy Alley in the Gulf of Mexico, there will be winners as well as losers.

"Winners: Oil service companies, especially those that fix broken rigs and pipelines and shuttle crews back and forth to platforms. Also, disaster recovery companies that clean up after hurricanes.

"Among individual stocks Tetra Technologies (NYSE: TTI) is an oil services company that provides plugging and abandonment services on offshore wells. 

"Hurricane cleanup last year blew a lot of new business Tetra's way. The company looks cheap, trading at a price-to-earnings growth of 0.7, and it recently hit a three-year high in free cash flow.

"Home Depot (NYSE: HD) is America's home fix-it center. The company always cleans up on hurricanes — selling supplies before and after the storms and raking in bigger profits.

Last year's storm season couldn't save the stock, which was crushed by the falling housing market. Now, however, Home Depot is dirt-cheap, and hurricane gains could give it more of a boost.

"Losers: Oil drillers and producers with large operations in the Gulf of Mexico, as well as insurance companies.

"Allstate (NYSE: ALL) is the largest publicly traded U.S. home and auto insurer saw its bottom line clobbered by Ike and Gustav last year. 

"Along with damage from a record number of tornadoes, the two storms gave Allstate a whopping $1.82 billion in catastrophe costs in the third quarter of last year — its first money-losing quarter since hurricane Katrina. Do you think this company is sensitive to storm season? Yes!

"Plus, Allstate has bounced back hard with the market rally, so it's set up for a fall. To be sure, Allstate could get a bailout from Uncle Sam — it's hard to tell what the Good-Time Charlies in Washington will throw money at next — but if the winds pick up, Allstate looks pretty vulnerable.

"Anadarko Petroleum (NYSE: APC) is a strong company, and one I've traded from the bullish side before. But hurricanes have the potential to be kryptonite for this company.

"Anadarko operates the Independence Hub, a platform complex located more than 100 miles offshore that has the capacity to handle 1 billion cubic feet of daily production.

"Last summer, Anadarko had to shut down its production in the Gulf and evacuate its personnel from offshore platforms due to hurricanes. The company lost 5 million barrels of oil equivalent (BOE) of production.

"These are all speculative plays. Not only are you speculating on the stocks, but you're speculating on the weather. But if you feel like you know whether we're in for a strong hurricane season or not, these stocks — both bullish and bearish — could be just the ticket."