{"id":3562,"date":"2014-12-26T09:32:52","date_gmt":"2014-12-26T14:32:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=3562"},"modified":"2014-12-26T09:32:52","modified_gmt":"2014-12-26T14:32:52","slug":"drilling-cutbacks-mean-service-companies-forced-to-scrap-rigs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=3562","title":{"rendered":"Drilling Cutbacks Mean Service Companies Forced to Scrap Rigs"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/oilprice.com\/Energy\/Oil-Prices\/Drilling-Cutbacks-Mean-Service-Companies-Forced-to-Scrap-Rigs.html\">Drilling Cutbacks Mean Service Companies Forced to Scrap Rigs<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-size: 1em; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 1em 0px; border: 0px initial initial;\">Despite the decline in oil prices, the U.S. is expected to boost production by 300,000 barrels per day in 2015, up to a yearly average of about 9.3 million barrels per day, according to the most recent government\u00a0<a style=\"font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-size: 14px; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; color: #24606c; text-decoration: underline; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; outline-color: initial; padding: 0px; margin: 0px; border: 0px initial initial;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.eia.gov\/forecasts\/steo\/\">estimates<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-size: 1em; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 1em 0px; border: 0px initial initial;\">But the number of oil and gas rigs in operation is already beginning to drop. For the week ending in December 19,\u00a0<a style=\"font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-size: 14px; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; color: #24606c; text-decoration: underline; outline-style: none; outline-width: initial; outline-color: initial; padding: 0px; margin: 0px; border: 0px initial initial;\" href=\"http:\/\/phx.corporate-ir.net\/phoenix.zhtml?c=79687&amp;p=irol-reportsother\">the rig count<\/a>\u00a0dropped to 1,875 active rigs, down from 1,893 a week earlier. The fall off is an indication that exploration companies are beginning to pare back investments. Pulling back on drilling may result in a lower future production, which could hurt the growth prospects of some oil firms.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-size: 1em; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; padding: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 1em 0px; border: 0px initial initial;\">However, the slowdown in drilling activity is having a much more immediate and acute effect on a separate set of companies \u2013 those supplying the rigs.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"color: #393939; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;\"><\/span><span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"color: #393939; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;\">Offshore oil contractors such as Halliburton or Transocean have seen their share prices tank worse than exploration companies because their revenue comes from being paid to drill, not necessarily from oil production after wells are completed. That means that when drilling slumps, their profits take an immediate hit. Even worse, exploration companies may see rising profits from existing production as oil prices rebound, but drilling service companies don\u2019t benefit if their drilling contracts had been put on hold or cancelled.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><!-- [if gte mso 9]><xml>\n <w:WordDocument>\n  <w:Zoom>0<\/w:Zoom>\n  <w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery>0<\/w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery>\n  <w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery>0<\/w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery>\n  <w:UseMarginsForDrawingGridOrigin\/>\n <\/w:WordDocument>\n<\/xml><![endif]--> <!--StartFragment--><\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\"><a name=\"OLE_LINK1\"><\/a><a name=\"OLE_LINK2\"><\/a><span style=\"mso-bookmark: OLE_LINK1;\"><span style=\"font-size: 13.0pt; font-family: LucidaGrande; color: #282828;\">&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><!--EndFragment--><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Drilling Cutbacks Mean Service Companies Forced to Scrap Rigs. Despite the decline in oil prices, the U.S. is expected to boost production by 300,000 barrels per day in 2015, up to a yearly average of about 9.3 million barrels per day, according to the most recent government\u00a0estimates. But the number of oil and gas rigs [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1019,1775,2121,723],"class_list":["post-3562","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy-2","tag-oil-drilling","tag-oil-price-collapse","tag-oil-rig-count","tag-shale-oil"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3562","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3562"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3562\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3563,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3562\/revisions\/3563"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3562"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3562"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3562"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}