Quick Thoughts

This morning, the Norwegian Financial daily Finansavisen reported in no uncertain terms that Aker Group, owned by Kjell Inge Røkke, is about to sell Aker Solutions to Halliburton. We have detailed analysis of the possibility including a cliff hanger question you don’t want to miss… There’s a lot more to this story… To …

Looking around at the headlines this morning, everyone’s talking about oil prices “plunging” or “slumping” below $50 (example). Whether oil is $49 or $51 doesn’t make that much of a difference for industry participants themselves – be they oil service firms or E&Ps they serve. To be sure, there may be …

In an unexpected announcement Monday evening, Weatherford welcomed of Mark McCollum, Halliburton’s CFO, as its new permanent CEO and director. For Weatherford, choosing between interim CEO Krishna Shivram and McCollum was a win/win. Shivram impressed everyone during his stint at the helm, but McCollum is the stronger candidate. So when the board realized …

On Wednesday afternoon, Weatherford announced that a new alliance has been formed with Nabors Industries to integrate drilling rigs and services in the US land market. This new service model is something Schlumberger has been talking about and working on for several years now. In this update, we offer our take …

The shale industry kicked off the new year with a continuation of the great migration to the Permian Basin. This morning SM Energy announced the sale of its third party operated assets in the Eagle Ford, including its ownership interest in related midstream assets, for $800 million. In this update we …

Land drilling / pressure pumping hybrids Patterson-UTI and Seventy Seven Energy have agreed to join forces as 2016 draws to a close. Patterson-UTI will purchase Seventy Seven Energy for $1.76bn in an all-stock deal that includes the assumption and repayment of $336mm of net debt. This deal isn’t a bargain, as …

BJ Services returned to the scene as a standalone company late Tuesday as Baker Hughes announced the pressure pumping divestiture they talked about before the GE deal and confirmed during the GE announcement. We break down the deal including observations about value, Goldman Sach’s interesting history with BJ Services, and some …

On Wednesday morning (11/16), Weatherford sold 84.5mm shares at $5.40/share in a registered direct equity offering for $456mm. Last week, Infill Thinking predicted that Weatherford would raise equity capital following the stock’s 33%+ gain on CEO Bernard Duroc-Danner’s departure. The market reacted positively to today’s equity raise, Weatherford’s stock rising another 3% …

Developing November 9, 2016 4pm central. What Happened: On Wednesday afternoon, Weatherford announced the departure of Chairman and CEO Bernard Duroc-Danner, 63, effective immediately. We explore why and what’s next. To read this update you must be a subscriber. (Current members login here.) Subscribers get Exclusive e-mail newsletters High-caliber, data-driven news, analysis and commentary New angles you’ll only find here …

After four days of speculation and head scratching over what kind of deal GE and Baker Hughes might be concocting, the companies announced an extensive partnership Monday morning, essentially a merger of GE O&G with Baker Hughes. The deal is more extensive than we (and many others) originally expected late last week. …