A leading Wall Street oil analyst has named Conoco Inc. the top E&P performer among the world's publicly traded major oil companies for a second consecutive year. Michael Mayer and his associate, Andrew F. Rosenfeld, at Prudential Securities graded the 13 majors on nine indicators: adjusted production; depreciation, depletion and amortization expenses; production income; quality of earnings; cash flow; production replacement ratios (excluding acquisitions and divestments); finding and development costs (including acquisitions and divestments); discounted future net cash flow; and upstream returns. The study looked at each company's performance in the 1995-99 period. Conoco pushed just past favorite BP. "These results are very gratifying and are further evidence that Conoco can find, develop and produce oil and natural gas reserves as competitively as anyone in the industry," said Rob McKee, Conoco executive vice president for E&P. "By doing things very well, Conoco is gaining worldwide industry respect as a leader in upstream operations." In 1992, the company ranked last in Mayer's 10-year-old annual survey. Conoco has since undertaken a dedicated effort to improve upstream performance, McKee said, reducing upstream overhead by about 20% and achieving significant production growth from operations in Venezuela, Vietnam, Canada, the British North Sea, Russia and the Gulf of Mexico. The company's drilling success rate has improved, with 50% of wildcats in 1999 having commercial potential. Finding and development costs have been reduced to a five-year average in 1999 of less than $4.50 per barrel of oil equivalent, from a 1992 five-year average of $7. And reserves have grown more than 50%. -Jodi Wetuski