Infill Thinking Lifting the O&G knowledge curve

Permian oilfield service and drilling contractors are having one great start to the year. Contractors got another dose of good news yesterday as Noble Energy expanded in the Permian Basin with the acquisition of Clayton Williams. In this update, we discuss why the deal is good for oilfield service contractors …

In the first months of the downturn, we began warning that a workforce designed for $100 oil is not the same one needed at $50 oil. However, the oilfield service industry right sized extremely quickly to lower activity levels over the past two years. We’ll soon see just how surgical these cuts …

Nothing can go up and to the right forever, especially not the rig count. The US onshore rig count fell back by six units this week. This break is actually a good thing and we explain why and break down the weekly rig count in in this post. There’s a …

WPX Energy joined in the Permian deal making fray, announcing a $775mm Delaware Basin acquisition late Thursday. 2017 operating plan announcements from Permian Independents aren’t the standard fare this year. We are used beginning of year E&P operating plans stating capex, production, and drilling program summaries. This year they are …

In a related update published last week, we described how the brute force enterprise of nano-darcy E&P is becoming more elegant. Elegance is achieved as sub-surface understanding moves closer to a realistic picture of the reservoir. Enhancing sub-surface understanding is where leading innovators in shale are focused today. They are …

News from Parsley Energy and SM Energy on Tuesday continued the Great Permian Migration trend this week. We break down the news into the most important incremental bullet points and provide a few words on the bigger picture trend in the Permian. By the way, if you are looking to …

Last week we published a list of four companies we expect to make oil service acquisitions during 2017. Apparently grass isn’t growing under our buyers feet – less than a week after our preview, one of them has already made a purchase. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see …

On February 2, Weatherford’s new CEO Krishna Shivram will talk to investors for the first time as the boss of the company. He’s got some work to do. The market will be looking for a restoration of confidence. That means Krishna needs to have a story for the new Weatherford …

Another week of US onshore rig count gains is in the books. But before we quantify that in our weekly statistical update (see full update below), the other side of the equation deserves a few words. Everyone is focused on rising rig counts today. Tomorrow they’ll be focused on dayrates. And …

We don’t normally republish articles from third party sources in full. But an in depth survey on the state of the Permian released at the end of last year is making the rounds this week. And if you haven’t seen it yet, it is definitely worth taking a look. Runaway …

In E&P, most analysts expect M&A action to be hot and heavy during the first half of 2017. There is less consensus about a wave of M&A coming in oilfield service (OFS), partly because of challenging valuations. So we put pen to paper this week and came up with the …

On a conference call in 2011, the always eloquent Clay Williams of National Oilwell Varco (then CFO, now CEO) said: The unconventional shale model is utterly unlike drilling a generation ago, which saw fleeting glimpses of precious darcy reservoir rock here or there, elusive four-way closure, a rare and fortuitous geologic …

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 …

US land drillers sent 2016 packing with a bang. Since May, the drilling recovery has looked exceptionally strong on a percentage basis. The December trend looked exceptionally strong on an absolute basis too with 65 US rigs returning to work. December 2016 delivered the best absolute rig count increase of …

Two years into the downturn and at oil prices just half of prior highs, the US tight oil industry has begun to stage a recovery. We’ve all seen this new optimism in the tangible data. Rig count, capex, headcount, frac utilization – these are just a few of the US …

Each winter, we look forward to unwrapping the annual rig census report released by National Oilwell Varco. With it’s uniquely comprehensive rig market history, the report provides good perspective on the competitive landscape for drilling rigs around the world. There were no surprises on the demand side this year – …

It’s fair to say that the blow out preventer (BOP) business model is being re-shaped as we write. 10 months ago, GE and Diamond introduced a new BOP arrangement to the marketplace – one that transfers up-time responsibility to the OEM. This week, the largest BOP supplier moved to implement …

In an interim update posted this morning, oilfield chemical supplier Flotek positively revised its outlook to account for a more constructive US drilling and completions market as 2016 winds down. Last week we wrote about how the consensus 4Q slump is a no show this year. Flotek’s announcement provides confirmation and …

The US land drilling market is exiting the worst downturn in history. Why not follow that with the sharpest rebound ever? That is exactly what is happening now. Since bottoming about 30 weeks ago, the US rig count has increased 60%. The 1985 recovery outpaced this one for 25 weeks before falling back. The only …

In the US, the O&G industry has begun to hire staff again for the first time in two years. We snapped this encouraging photo in front of a Halliburton completions yard while touring the Permian Basin in early-December. Source: InfillThinking.com Given what we know about the ongoing recovery and a …

Frac IPOs are back.  We mean that literally because the company about to make its public debut will trade under the ticker FRAC. This week, Keane Group Inc., owner of the 7th largest US frac fleet and employer of 1,251, filed an S-1 for a potential IPO. The company is …

This holiday season is the most jolly in years for the oil and gas business. It finally feels like the tide is turning on many fronts. One Year Ago, We Predicted Everything Would Bottom In 2016 Exactly one year ago, we wrote the following outlook for another shop: As realists, we have …

The Fed raised interest rates for the second time in a decade on Wednesday. The Federal Open Market Committee raised its target range by a quarter point to 0.5% – 0.75%. The committee also expects to make three rate hikes in 2017, two or three in 2018 and three in 2019. …

Even when offshore drillers aren’t tapping the capital markets for debt or equity, financial restructuring is quietly continuing behind the scenes. Contractual terms continue to be renegotiated with customers, and price concessions are still being given. Literally hundreds of multi-year contracts that were in effect this time two years ago have …

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 …

If OPEC’s November 30th decision to cut production was like adding tinder to smoldering embers, then progress made over this past weekend was like dumping gasoline on the fire. Lower 48 oilfield activity will gather steam (and quickly) in early-2017. As the upstream supply chain tightens early in the new year, …

Back in October, the North American land market was bracing for a seasonal slowdown into year-end. Here’s the warning Halliburton CEO Dave Lesar issued on a conference call about 6 weeks ago: “Based on current customer feedback we remain cautious around customer activity due to holiday and seasonal weather-related downtime. Our customers …

Compared to PDC Energy’s budget release earlier this week, Chevron’s 2017 continuing budget cuts are a stark reminder of the divergence theme we first wrote about in early-November. That said, these budget cuts are impacting most every area except one, the Permian. We break down the majors budget for subscribers …

In US onshore markets, pipe has long been approached as a cumbersome consumable by the E&P industry. Suppliers haven’t historically provided much hand holding along to go with tubes sold, and many operators have found themselves practically in the pipe business themselves. In the conventional model, operators are invoiced when …

We visited the sprawling $36mm Tenaris Midland Service Center this week. From this new Permian Basin facility, Tenaris is introducing Rig Direct™ to the US shale plays. Here Tenaris is running OCTG (casing and tubing), sucker rods, coiled tubing, and accessories in 24/7 operations. The Midland Service Center is the …

Pioneer Natural Resources is known for progressive thinking on partnerships. The company’s effluent water deal with the City of Odessa is a good example of how the company builds novel relationships to drive costs down. So when Tenaris proposed an unusual alliance around shared yard space, Pioneer listened. The end …

Offshore drilling contractors have been signing deals with shipyards to delay taking rig delivery for several years now. With no visibility on work, it’s better to leave rigs on the docks where they took shape than to store them somewhere harsher. This morning Atwood announced a delay deal on a pair of …

We are in Midland/Odessa this week for meetings and site visits. The vibe here now is very different from our last visit 10 months ago. There is more field traffic on I-20, parking lots are fuller, and there is a stirring in the yards. In this post we discuss firsthand intel from …

PDC Energy is out with their 2017 spending program Monday morning, the first budget we’ve seen released since OPEC announced a production cut last week and sent crude oil prices up 10%. It doesn’t disappoint. We delve into the details and warn why readers should not extrapolate the percentage increase …

Although not everyone is happy about it, we think Chesapeake’s new logo looks pretty good. Actually, really good. As reported by The Oklahoman last week, the company is rolling out a re-brand starting in January 2017, reflecting their evolution from ambitious young natural gas company (remember the blue flame in the …

While the rest of the world focused on OPEC on November 30, US operators were focused on making their tight oil wells more effective with cutting edge innovation. We spent OPEC day in Houston with 35 senior US completions executives at the Darcy Completions Forum, squarely focused on emerging technologies …

The new Weatherford CEO is reportedly in the process of undoing his predecessor’s hydraulic fracturing business plan. If what we’ve been told by industry contacts is true, Krishna Shivram (pictured left) is throttling back frac operations in dramatic fashion. This would be the second big move he’s made in three weeks at the …

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 …

There’s an OPEC meeting this week, have you heard? In a Google News scan Monday morning, we counted more than 100 articles about OPEC published in the last 24 hours alone. Enough will be written this week about the pageantry in Vienna to fill a small library. Endless speculation leading up …

Since inception, hydraulic fracturing and shale exploitation have been fraught with controversy. Initial opposition mostly came from the far left and environmentalists. So called “fracktivists” include bands of protesters, lobbyists pushing for regulation, and filmmakers documenting mythical terrors. These outsiders have presented challenges for the industry ranging from mild annoyances to outright banishment …

Helmerich & Payne’s FlexRig3s have made the company the best-in-class US land driller for a decade. Ask any analyst who the best land driller with the best fleet is and they’ll say H&P almost unanimously. But will that always be the case? Now for the first time in a decade, management is having …

Permian acreage values are changing rapidly, frustrating those who want in and providing a windfall to incumbent operators. What some are calling an acreage valuation bubble in the Permian may be just the tip of an inflation iceberg in the play. A tsunami of capital targeting deals in the region …

For service and drilling contractors that want a piece of Saudi Aramco’s $30bn annual budget, a line has been drawn in the desert sand. As we write, the NOC is making some of its first big moves to make good on an ambitious local content plan unveiled about a year ago. …

Last week, we rolled out an installment in our Thinking Ahead series taking a forward look at US production and estimating 2017 production levels. We’ve also been paying attention to operator commentary on 2017 drilling programs and capex. In this post, we add it all up and put our necks on the …

The biggest regional contributor to the US Shale Revolt will be the Permian Basin. The Permian is the only unconventional oil play where production has not fallen in the downturn. In fact, Permian production today is up 13% since that fateful OPEC meeting two years ago. Following it’s conventional production …

The period from 2009-2014 was affectionately dubbed the US Shale Revolution. During the “revolution,” 40 years of American production declines were reversed in 5 with horizontal drilling and fracing. The revolution was a capital-intensive growth phase enabled by high oil prices. Today, we submit a new term to describe the …

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% …

Two months ago, we penned a deep dive on the offshore drilling outlook, concluding that things still must get worse before they get better. Atwood’s conference call yesterday provided a good theory test, and we came away with confirmation of our multi-year hard landing view. Here are the most important fundamental …

In the decade we’ve been covering the oil business, we can’t recall another period of time when technology and efficiency gains were occurring this fast. And as students of this industry, we’d argue that there’s been no time in history when O&G industry methods were advancing at today’s pace. Globally, human …

There were a lot of smart things about the Nabors analyst day last week. One of those was the timing. Nabors was smart to host its event after most of the other contract drillers hosted their earnings conference calls in the weeks leading up to the event – the timing …