A weekly update on issues important to the oil and gas industry
As the clouds begin to clear from the oil patch storm that began three months ago, management, analysts and investors are wondering what is going to happen next. Has the proverbial storm system passed? Is it time to venture out and rebuild, or are we still in the eye of the hurricane, with the back wall on its way? Both are possibilities.
In this post, we examine some of the most discussed items and trends from the Q1 2020 earnings calls, specifically those in the mineral aggregator space.
In this post, we examine some of the most discussed items and trends from E&P companies’ Q1 earnings calls.
The fact that valuations in the mineral and royalty space have decreased is not news at this point, but what is interesting is that this environment has changed a lot of things along the way.
The recent historic decline in oil prices has strained the balance sheets of E&P companies. Whiting Petroleum Corporation, the first publicly traded U.S. E&P company to declare bankruptcy in 2020, announced its Chapter 11 reorganization process on April 1. More are expected to follow.
Despite a much more benign commodity price environment of ~$50-$60/bbl in 2019, a number of E&P companies declared bankruptcy last year and have seen their reorganization processes derailed in 2020 as a result of low oil prices.
Times are tumultuous for the oil and gas industry. News earlier this month was met with no rise in West Texas Intermediate pricing at the time. It hovered around $20.00 per barrel. Last week it fell to the seemingly unconscionable negative territory. It was worse in other places. In Western Canada heavy select oil was around $4.50 per barrel and dropped to $0 last week. It went negative as well. World demand for oil has dropped somewhere between 20% and 35% by some estimations, and excess supply has been building for weeks.
Something must give, and something will. While global supply and demand imbalance has the industry scrambling in unseen territory, how does this convert to what upstream companies and reserves are worth amid the situation? Is it a 1:1 price to value change ratio? Depending on perspective, the answer is both simple and complicated.
It’s been a truly dizzying time in the rough-n-tumble world of oil production. Like they say, if you miss a day, you miss a lot. For now, it at least appears that someone may have just blinked. The Trump administration seems to be on the verge of a truly historic deal to cut worldwide oil production and bring oil prices up to a modestly workable level. And that with the U.S. not committing to forcing domestic producers to cut production levels but indicating that U.S. production would “naturally” decline without the government’s intervention. That coupled with a potential side-deal with Mexico to “cover” part of the production decrease that was being sought from that country, but that Mexico is unwilling to shoulder on its own. Will it work? Will the deal be accomplished? Although an agreement was reached to reduce oil production in light of demand destruction caused by the coronavirus pandemic, oil markets appear to remain oversupplied. Will OPEC+ and other nations agree to another deal to further reduce production? Will U.S. production decline faster than anticipated due to low oil prices? Will the Texas Railroad Commission implement proration orders for Texas producers? All we can say is, stay tuned – and expect the unexpected.
In this post we examine the macroeconomic factors that have affected prices in this first quarter.
The economics of oil and gas production vary by region. Mercer Capital focuses on trends in the Eagle Ford, Permian, Bakken, and Marcellus and Utica plays. The cost of producing oil and gas depends on the geological makeup of the reserve, depth of reserve, and cost to transport the raw crude to market. We can observe different costs in different regions depending on these factors. This quarter we take a closer look at the Eagle Ford.
Over the last year, deal activity in the Eagle Ford Shale was relatively steady, picking up towards the end of 2019 and carrying into early 2020. This week we discuss recent transactions in the Eagle Ford.
