Barron's Pans Oil Refiners...

...and later claims that the drops in their stock shows the panning was sound. The original article claimed that there was more to the gasoline consumtion drop than hard times: Americans are trading in less fuel-efficient cars for more fuel-efficient ones, a trend that the author claims is a long-term one.

The two stocks mentioned as evidence were Sunoco Inc. and Tesoro. The former dropped 1.86% in regular trading, but the latter only dropped 0.78% Tesoro's decline was about in line with the overall market, and Sunoco's was fairly gentle compared to some other oil stocks. Both were up in after-hours trading, too. Perhaps Barron's Online was a little eager to showcase the work, although time will tell.

Interestingly, another Bin stock in refining got slaughtered today, but was not mentioned by Barron's. Recent high-flyer Holly Corp. was down 4.07%, and was unchanged in after-hours trading.


Update: Perhaps I spoke too soon. Sunoco was slaughtered the following day, with a 4.68% plummet in its stock. On the other hand, Tesoro was down only 0.85%. Its two-day drop was less than the S&P 500's one-day September 1st drop.


Update 2: Tesoro's being hammered now. So, it seems I did speak too soon.