Congressman Michael McCaul’s investments in oil stocks yielded hefty returns last year. Rep. McCaul, the U.S. representative for Texas's 10th congressional district since 2005, was consistently divesting his Chevron (CVX:US) stake after he had accumulated shares of the oil giant in recent years, including 2020 and 2021.

He was aggressively buying Chevron stock in late 2020, including a $250,000 - $500,000 investment in October, as well as several $100,000 - $250,000 transactions. CVX stock was mostly trading in the $170.00s in the fourth quarter of 2022. The influential Congressman then used the surge in oil prices to book profits, starting from December 2021. His latest sale was valued at $100,000 - $250,000 and made on June 06, when Chevron stock closed at $176.83.

A few weeks later, Rep. McCaul went back to buying oil stocks - this time investing in ConocoPhillips (COP:US). He used a mid-year dip in COP to buy the stock on July 05, when shares closed at $84.64 per share. For comparison purposes, ConocoPhillips shares are exchanging hands at nearly $120.00 a share this week.

In November, the oil company reported its third-quarter results and hiked the quarterly dividend by 11%. ConocoPhillips said it earned $4.6 billion on an adjusted basis in Q3 while ending the quarter with $10.7 billion in cash.

ConocoPhillips distributed $4.3 billion to our shareholders in the third quarter and announced an increase to our ordinary dividend effective in the fourth quarter,” said Ryan Lance, chairman, and chief executive officer. 

ConocoPhillips stock hit its all-time high in November 2022.