Investing.com -- Wolfe Research initiated coverage of three major oilfield services companies on Wednesday, assigning Outperform ratings to SLB and Baker Hughes while rating Halliburton at Peer Perform, as analyst Carlos Escalante said the industry faces "a selective capital cycle favoring international exposure."

On SLB, Wolfe set a $62 price target, calling it "best positioned for a selective capital cycle" with margin upside supported by the ChampionX integration and growth in its digital and data center business lines, which doubled from fiscal 2024 to 2025 and is expected to grow 13-15% annually over the next decade.

Escalante believes SLB's mid-cycle EV/EBITDA of 8.0 times represents "an unreasonable discount vs peers closer to 9.0x."

Baker Hughes received the most bullish initiation, with a $70 price target. Wolfe said BKR's free cash flow trajectory is "being mispriced at an OFS multiple," with its Industrial and Energy Technology business set to exceed 50% of EBITDA for the first time.

The pending $13.6 billion Chart Industries acquisition, awaiting EU regulatory approval, was flagged as a key catalyst that will "further accelerate revenue diversification" while adding a long-term project backlog across LNG, power, data centers and industrial decarbonization.

On Halliburton, Wolfe said outperformance is "largely macro dependent," requiring either renewed pricing power or confidence in a capital expenditure upcycle that has yet to materialize.

Escalante added that HAL carries the "largest North America exposure of the large-cap OFS group," making free cash flow growth "inextricably tied to domestic activity."