The stock price for Massey Energy might have dropped today, following Monday’s explosionat the company’s Upper Big Branch mine. But don’t count the coal giant out just yet. Despite the disaster, Wall Street analysts still see strong earnings potential in Massey. ABC News reportstoday that analysts at Jefferies & Co. are encouraging investors to scoop up Massey shares. The reason? “We believe Massey Energy is a well-capitalized Eastern coal producer and ranks as the largest, most diversified, and lowest-cost coal producer in Central Appalachia,” they wrote in a research note.
That “lowest cost” could in any way be related to a historyof safetyproblems at Massey’s mines, of course, is of no interest to the barons of Wall Street. But it has caught the attention of Congress. As Aaron pointed outearlier, Rep. Nick Rahall (D-W.Va.), the powerful chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee and a longtime defender of the coal industry, is calling for“accountability” surrounding the explosion. Rahall might want to take a look at this short video clip, in which a young Don Blankenship, now Massey’s outspoken CEO, outlines his business philosophy. “Unions, communities, people — everybody’s gonna have to accept that, in the United States, we have a capitalist society,” Blankenship said. “And that capitalism, from a business viewpoint, is survival of the most productive.”