Upstream oil execs agree: Low, long and living within means

The recent Barclays CEO Energy-Power Conference came at a crucial time in the current lower-for-longer oil price environment and clarified upstream CEOs' plans to weather what could be 2015 all over again for a couple of more years.

The gathering, which typically represents the highlight of the post-summer back-to-serious season and an important way station along the road to third-quarter conference calls, this year showed bare-bones budgets amid improving performance as key upstream themes during the rest of 2015 and potentially also 2016.

Executives' remarks at the September 8-10 conference, which also followed a brief but worrisome few days of sub-$40/b oil the previous week, before bounding up to the mid-$40s/b, showed a generally somber attitude. That contrasted with several months ago, when the accepted wisdom was that the industry downturn would last maybe a year or so and then return to business as usual (although maybe at or around $70/b).

Now, oil company chiefs appear to have accepted that oil prices are going to be around the $50/b mark for awhile and that they need to find a way to be profitable for the long while.

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Some conference takeaways:

• Operators are definitely planning for a long downturn. No more talk of a V-shaped recovery or similarities to the 2009 downturn; managers are erecting fiscal bomb shelters to withstand months to a couple of years of predicted tough times ahead.
• Spending within cash flow is a priority for most companies now, unlike the gravy days of recent years when outspending was common.
• Capital spending for 2016 will be lower than in 2015 — which itself has been 35%-40% below last year and could actually come in steeper in relative cuts than that, given that some operators have further slashed 2015 outlays and may still do so.
• While oil companies expect acquisition opportunities, most large operators are ready for it while believing that the bid-ask spread is still too wide and, in any case, the bulk of deals are a few months away yet.
• Even though costs for oilfield service and equipment have come down 15%-30% this year, upstream companies believe they may drop a bit further.
• As the fall bank redetermination season progresses, smaller E&P companies are saying they expect decreased borrowing bases, and this will determine 2016 capital spending programs.
• Despite lower capital spending and a relatively flat oil price projected next year, crude oil production will grow for some of the more prominent shale producers by single- or even lower double-digits.

Said Barclays in a report on conference takeaways: "If prices throughout the budget development season ... are consistent with the current 2016 forward price of around $50/b for WTI, capital spending could be down 25%-30% for the large-cap producers" in North America.

Even so, "we would caution investors not to expect a steep drop in US shale production even at that level of spending since maintenance capital requirements may be 25% lower in 2016," Barclays said.

Half of that drop will stem from moderating production decline rates, and the rest to lower service costs and improving well drilling and completion efficiencies, the bank said.

Barclays added it does not anticipate oil prices will fall low enough for companies — at least North American large-caps — "to choose to materially under-spend cash flow."

Outside the US, the investment bank said Canadian upstream producers "surprised to the upside" on stronger efficiencies for their production levels, while European names showed "constrained growth ambitions." Barclays estimated the latter group's 2016 capital budgets should be down 25% from this year and, on average, it is pricing operations based on around $65/b Brent.