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what it is
Empire buys and runs old oil and gas wells across five states, then sells the production to marketers.
how it gets paid
Last year Empire Petroleum made $34M in revenue. oil sales was the main engine at $22.8M, or 67% of sales.
why growth slowed
Revenue fell 21.6% last year. The number that matters is -208.5%, because a revenue pop does not matter much when the underlying business still burns economics that badly.
what just happened
Revenue hit $27M, but EP still posted a loss and the turnaround case stayed theoretical.
At a glance
C++ balance sheet — some cracks in the foundation
25/100 earnings predictability — expect surprises
25.9% return on capital — every dollar works hard here
-$0.54 fy2024 eps est
$44M fy2024 rev est
xvary composite: 41/100 — below average
What they do
Empire buys and runs old oil and gas wells across five states, then sells the production to marketers.
Empire’s edge is operational, not glamorous. It runs 1,072 gross wells with just 63 employees, which tells you the model is built around squeezing output from old fields without a huge payroll. If that works, your upside comes from better recovery and lower field costs, not from drilling the next Permian fairy tale.
How they make money
$34M
annual revenue · their business grew -21.6% last year
oil sales
$22.8M
24.0%
natural gas sales
$6.1M
18.0%
ngl sales
$3.5M
16.0%
other production revenue
$1.6M
12.0%
The products that matter
produces and sells crude oil
Crude Oil
$34.2M · main disclosed revenue stream
it generated $34.2M last year, down from $44.0M. when your main disclosed line drops 22%, the rest of the turnaround pitch has to work harder.
core revenue
produces and sells natural gas
Natural Gas
bundled disclosure · no standalone figure
natural gas is real economic exposure, but you do not get a separate revenue number here. thin disclosure is not a cosmetic issue when the company lost $72.1M.
secondary stream
Key numbers
-208.5%
core margin
Operating margin → profit from the actual business → so what: Empire lost more than $2 running the company for every $1 of revenue in 2024.
$34M
annual revenue
This is a very small company. A few million dollars either way changes the whole story.
25.9%
return on capital
Return on capital → profit earned on money invested → so what: some assets still throw off decent returns even while the income statement looks ugly.
$15M
long-term debt
Debt is only 12% of capital, which means the balance sheet is not the main fire right now. The operations are.
Financial health
C++
strength
- balance sheet grade C++ — below average — limited financial resources
- risk rank 3 — safer than 50% of stocks
- price stability 5 / 100
- long-term debt $15M (12% of capital)
C++ — below average. watch for debt servicing and cash burn.
Total return vs. market
Return history isn't available for EP right now.
source: institutional data · return history unavailable
What just happened
missed estimates
Revenue hit $27M, but EP still posted a loss and the turnaround case stayed theoretical.
EDGAR shows quarterly revenue up 189% vs. prior year to $27M, while EPS was -$0.39. Quarterly EPS in the 2024 history stayed negative all year, ending with a full-year loss of -$0.54.
$27M
revenue
$0.39
eps
n/a
operating margin
the number that mattered
The number that matters is -208.5%, because a revenue pop does not matter much when the underlying business still burns economics that badly.
source: company earnings report, 2026
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What could go wrong
EP is not dealing with abstract oil-patch risk. it is dealing with a specific problem: a $72.1M loss, a falling core revenue line, and disclosure that still leaves you guessing on part of the mix.
high
continued losses
empire petroleum lost $72.1M on $34.2M in revenue. that is a -210.72% margin. if losses stay larger than revenue, the balance sheet stops being a support and starts being a countdown.
the equity story turns into a financing story
high
crude oil revenue keeps shrinking
the core disclosed revenue line fell from $44.0M to $34.2M. you need that line to stabilize before you start giving the company credit for a recovery that is not in the numbers yet.
hits the main visible revenue stream directly
med
commodity-price dependence
this is an upstream operator. in human terms: oil and gas prices do a large share of the work for you. if realized pricing softens, there is no moat or margin buffer on this page to absorb it.
pressures revenue and pushes profitability further away
med
thin disclosure on the gas mix
natural gas is listed as bundled rather than broken out. when the business is this small and this unprofitable, missing granularity is not trivia — it limits your ability to tell what is actually improving.
reduces visibility when visibility is the whole job
a $109M company losing $72.1M while its cleanly disclosed revenue falls to $34.2M has very little room for another bad filing.
source: institutional data · regulatory filings · risk analysis
Pay attention to
metric
does the loss shrink from $72.1M
that is still the first number to watch in the next filing. revenue matters, but the real question is whether empire can stop losing more than it sells.
calendar
next quarterly update
the last major update came march 26, 2026. the next report needs to show more than survival — it needs to show operating repair.
risk
oil-price sensitivity
management has referenced a blended price above $72 per barrel for 2026. if realized pricing slips while disclosed product revenue is already down to $34.2M, the math gets worse fast.
trend
whether crude sales stop falling
the move from $44.0M to $34.2M is the clearest operating trend on the page. you want that line flattening out before you start telling yourself a turnaround story.
Analyst rankings
earnings predictability
25 / 100
earnings are hard to model here. in human-speak, analysts do not trust this business to produce clean, repeatable numbers yet.
risk rank
3
risk rank sits in the middle of the pack, but the 5 / 100 price stability score tells you the stock itself behaves much rougher than that label sounds.
source: institutional data
Institutional activity
institutional ownership data for EP is being compiled.
source: institutional data
Price targets
3-5 year target range
n/a
n/a
$3
current price
n/a
target midpoint · n/a from current
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