Encana Moves HQ From Canada To Colorado

Encana Corporation, which has just said that it is moving out of Canada to redomicile in the United States, has picked Denver, Colorado, for its new head office, the company said in an SEC filing.

Last week, Encana said it intends to move its corporate domicile from Canada to the United States and rebrand under a new name, amid a growing investor and company exodus from the Canadian oil patch plagued by pipeline capacity shortages and general anti-oil sentiment.

The new company will rebrand under the name Ovintiv Inc. After completing its corporate base shift and adopting the new name, the new company will begin trading on both the New York and Toronto stock exchanges under the ticker symbol "OVV."

“A domicile in the United States will expose our Company to increasingly larger pools of investment in U.S. index funds and passively managed accounts, as well as better align us with our U.S. peers,” CEO Doug Suttles said.

The choice of Denver as the new headquarters is not unexpected, considering that Suttles relocated to Denver in March 2018, according to Bloomberg.

Back then, Encana was insisting that Suttles relocating from Calgary to Denver is not a sign that the company would move out of the Canada and that the CEO was moving for personal reasons and already spends a lot of time working at Encana’s Denver office because the company has large U.S. shale operations.

A year and a half later, Encana is now moving its corporate domicile to the United States in order to be closer to U.S. investors.

Canadian companies moving business to the United States is a reflection of the opportunities that exist south of the border, Richard Masson, VP of World Petroleum Council-Canada told Bloomberg, adding that people in Western Canada were “shocked” that any Canadian company would feel the need to relocate.

“It’s a real comment on the state of our affairs here in our country and really not something that helps confidence going forward at all,” Masson told Bloomberg.

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

More Top Reads From Oilprice.com:

• The 10 Minute Charge: EVs Hit Major Milestone
• Human Batteries: Matrix Science Debunked
• Saudi Aramco’s Trillion Dollar Mystery