How to buy, sell and short BP shares

How to buy or invest in BP shares

You can buy BP shares in two different ways. The traditional way is to invest in the company by share dealing. Here, you’re buying shares directly in the company and becoming a shareholder – making you eligible to receive dividends (if paid) and vote in company decisions. The other way is to trade derivatives, like CFDs.

Trading derivatives involves speculating on the rise and fall of the market price of shares. If you think they’ll go up, it’s called ‘going long’. If you reckon they’ll go down, that’s known as ‘going short’.

Keen to trade in BP shares? Here’s how to do it with IG:

Trading BP shares

1. Create or log in to your trading account and go to our trading platform
2. Type ‘BP’ in the search bar and select it
3. Choose your position size
4. Click ‘buy’ in the deal ticket
5. Open your position and monitor your trade

How to sell or short BP shares

You could short BP shares. ‘Shorting’ or ‘short-selling’ shares with spread bets or CFDs means you can make a profit if the share price falls. This is possible because you can take a position without actually owning any shares by using leverage.

You can also short shares to hedge your existing investment. If you suffer losses from one position, the profits from the other will offset those losses. Learn more about hedging.

Here’s how to sell or short BP shares with IG:

Shorting BP shares

1. Create or log in to your trading account and go to our trading platform
2. Type ‘BP’ in the search bar and select it
3. Choose your position size
4. Click ‘sell’ in the deal ticket
5. Confirm and monitor your short position

BP’s live market prices

BP shares: the basics

Headquartered in London, BP has operations in 79 countries across Europe, North and South America, Asia, Australasia and Africa. It has a primary listing on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) and a secondary listing on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange (FWB). You’ll find BP listed under the ‘BP’ ticker.

BP appointed a new chief executive officer (CEO) on 1 July 2020, Bernard Looney, who has served on the company’s top executive team since November 2010. Leading the oil and gas company into sustainable territory, Looney drove reductions of nearly 3 million tons of CO2 equivalent in just two years.

BP hasn’t escaped the negative impact of the coronavirus pandemic. Share prices fell drastically earlier this year, taking its biggest tumble in mid-March – going from 453p at the start of February to 236p on 18 March.

Have a look at the graph below showing the fall of the BP share price from 3 February 2020 to 14 August 2020.

What is BP’s business model?

BP freshened up its business model in 2020. In addition to delivering a range of energy products and services, it now also invests in companies that develop new tech, specifically to benefit BP and global energy systems.

This new business model has three parts:

1. Finding and generating energy, namely additional energy resources and renewable energy
2. Refining, manufacturing and marketing of petrochemical products
3. Delivering products and services, such as fuel and rapid electric vehicle charging

BP key personnel: who manages the company?

There are 12 people who make up BP’s executive management team:

How to analyse BP’s share price

For accurate insight into BP’s share price performance, you’ll need to do both fundamental and technical analysis.

Fundamental analysis involves looking at the macroeconomic influences that affect a share price. Changes in senior leadership, interest rates, product changes, and in BP’s case, even climate change and pollution – these factors will all impact the share price.

Some of the common metrics you could use to conduct fundamental analysis include BP’s price-to-earnings ratio (P/E ratio), return on equity (ROE), and earnings per share (EPS).

Technical analysis aims to predict what the share price might do in the future by looking at its history. You’ll look at chart patterns and price action to determine what value the market may hold.

Buying BP shares summed up

• You can buy BP shares in two ways – traditional investment and trading derivatives
• Investing in BP shares involves taking ownership of the company’s stock and will make you eligible to receive dividends (if paid) and vote on key decisions
• Trading derivatives such as CFDs enables you to take a position without owning any underlying shares
• Shorting shares allows you to potentially make a profit when the share price falls using CFDs
• You can use fundamental and technical analysis to gain insight into BP’s share price performance