Has Marathon Petroleum Corp (MPC) Become the Perfect Stock? – HollyFrontier Corp (HFC), Western Refining, Inc. (WNR)

Marathon Petroleum Corp (NYSE:MPC), though, isn’t going to miss out on cheap North American crude. The company has boosted its refinery capacity at its Detroit facility to use more Canadian heavy crude, which is extremely inexpensive compared with U.S. crude. By doing so, it hopes to cut its overall input costs and send profits even higher.

Marathon has also jumped onto the MLP bandwagon, having done an initial public offering of its midstream business into MPLX LP (NYSE:MPLX) . Initially supported by assets contributed by Marathon, MPLX will be a big player in the eastern U.S., as it focuses on the Utica, Marcellus, and Illinois Basin shale plays.

For Marathon to improve, it needs to push its dividend higher to help shareholders participate more strongly in its success. Over time, the potential for revenue growth could also help Marathon Petroleum Corp (NYSE:MPC) get a lot closer to perfection than it is today.

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No stock is a sure thing, but some stocks are a lot closer to perfect than others. By looking for the perfect stock, you’ll go a long way toward improving your investing prowess and learning how to separate out the best investments from the rest.

The article Has Marathon Petroleum Become the Perfect Stock? originally appeared on Fool.com and is written by Dan Caplinger.

Fool contributor Dan Caplinger has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool owns shares of Western Refining.

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