Financing New World investments with Old World profits is a strategy that worked often enough in the Age of Discovery.

It’s working again for the moment for the leading global oil services supplier Schlumberger (NYSE: SLB), which is using the windfalls earned in the Saudi desert and the Russian Arctic to extend its reach in North America.

Source: company presentation

The quarterly results reported by the company last week once again surpassed high expectations, further raised by the ambitious growth plans Schlumberger unveiled the prior month. Second-quarter revenue was up 8% year-over-year while operating earnings per share jumped 19%, ending analysts’ consensus estimate.

More impressively still, cash flow from operations was up 77% year-over-year while free cash flow grew 57% to $1.9 billion in the quarter, enabling the company to buy back nearly $2.1 billion in stock while using inexpensive debt to finance its dividend and the large but steady investments in equipment and technology.

Schlumberger is aiming to earn $9 to $10 per share by 2017, with 75% of that annual profit feeding through to free cash flow that could be returned to shareholders.

The stock slipped following the results because this was a clean single rather than a home run, the incremental gains tempered by relatively cautious commentary on global economic growth and industry spending plans. But Schlumberger has proven masterful at exploiting scalable opportunities during the recent slowdown in North American spending on oil services, and there’s no reason to believe it’s lost its touch.

Continue buying the No. 2 Best Buy SLB below $130.