The Big Big Big Players
The oil and gas sector is notorious for booms and busts. The ongoing bust cycle, however, is beginning to look like the new norm with investors continuing to give the sector a wide berth. Oil and gas stocks have fallen so much that you would have to go back to 1979 to find a time when their weighting in the S&P 500 was this low – just 4 percent.
The alarm bells sounded last year after the sector’s biggest name, ExxonMobil (NYSE: XOM), dropped from the S&P 500’s Top 10 for the first time in nine decades. Energy stocks have declined another 34.6 percent so far this year and are looking to extend a decade of underperformance.
The U.S. oil and gas sector was once worth a combined $3 trillion; now there are three companies with higher valuations than the entire sector.
- Apple
- Microsoft
- Amazon
Who is Liable for Orphan Wells?
Terry Etam, End of the Fossil Fuel Insanity, BOE Report and Public Energy Number One, dives into the abandoned well issue in America and Canada.
Etam explains how Canada approaches the issue of “orphan” and “abandoned” wells and cites a recent Reuters article for the American juxtaposition.
Etam says often times companies have come and gone while the well remains, so is the landowner on the hook? Or is it the state or society’s issue?
“It’s a huge issue and what makes it so interesting is that a lot of these wells have changed hands many times and the original owners who drilled them are long gone and the people who produced them might be long gone and been bought and sold a half a dozen times since,” Etam said. “So who do you hang the liability on when all those people are long gone? Is it the present owner?
Teaching Old Cowboys New Tricks
Jake Milne and Bailey Midkiff, W.I.C., discuss how new opportunities have added Adam Dickinson to the W.I.C. team. The trio discuss how new technologies are “teaching old cowboys” new tricks and innovations.
The difficulty and acceptance of different technologies are discussed from the HR department to the shop to the remote sales areas of industry.
“On this side of things I am definitely more of an old school guy, I prefer to shake your hand,” Jake Milne said. “(Innovation) It’s definitely taken over. Zoom works well, I’m a Google guy.”
The Crude Life Podcast can be heard every Monday through Thursday with a Week in Review on Friday.
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