U.S. Oil, Gas Drillers See Continued Slowdown

The total number of active drilling rigs for oil and gas in the United States fell this week, according to new data that Baker Hughes published on Friday.

The total rig count fell by 8 to 605 this week, compared to 748 rigs this same time last year.

The number of oil rigs fell by 7 this week, after falling by 5 in the week prior. Oil rigs now stand at 499--down by 89 compared to this time last year. The number of gas rigs fell by 3 this week to 102, a loss of 55 active gas rigs from this time last year. Miscellaneous rigs rose by 2.

Meanwhile, U.S. crude oil production stayed the same for the eighth week in a row at an average of 13.1 million bpd for the week ending April 26—down 200,000 bpd from the all-time high of 13.3 million bpd.

Primary Vision’s Frac Spread Count, an estimate of the number of crews completing wells that are unfinished, slipped in the week ending April 26, to 257. Completions fell by 3 for the week.

The Permian saw a 1-rig decrease after falling by 1 in the week prior. The count in the Eagle Ford fell by 3 this week after seeing no change in the week prior.

Oil prices were trading down on Friday with both benchmarks trading about $0.50 down per barrel. At 12:46 p.m. ET, before the data release, the WTI benchmark was trading down $0.50 (-0.63%) on the day at $78.45. This is about $5.50 below last week’s price at this time.

The Brent benchmark was trading down $0.41 (-0.49%) at $83.26, a roughly $6 per barrel decrease from a week ago.

By Julianne Geiger for Oilprice.com

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