Weekly Rig Count: Gas Rigs Continue to Drop

U.S Rig Count
 For the week ending March 23, 2012, U.S.working rigs declined by 16. The majority of these were gas drilling rigs (-11), versus oil (-4).

 Oil/-Gas Split
From the graph to the right, you can see the trend in gas rigs dropping off as persistently low natural gas prices has made drilling for dry gas uneconomical in most plays. Oil rigs now make up 2/3 of working U.S. rigs. This time of year, last year, oil rigs didn't even make up half.
YoY oil rigs are up 54%, while gas rigs are down 25%.




Major State Variances
We can see operators shifting rigs to more oily regions, like the Bakken and Eagle Ford, and out of gassy plays like in the Barnett and Haynesville.
This is putting pressure on  margins of drilling service companies.

Drilling Rigs: Company Market Share by Plays
Haynesville and Bakken
Nabors Industries (NBR) has the majority of market share in Haynesville (~30%); however, they also have the largest market share in the Bakken (~23%).
Barnett 
Patterson-UTI Energy (PTEN) has the largest market share (~30%) in the Barnett (for gas rigs).
Eagle Ford
Helmerich & Payne (HP) has the largest market share in the Eagle Ford  for oil rigs (~28%).
In the DJ Basins/Niabrara, Trinidad Drilling (TDG.T) has largest market share (~19%).
-Source: Global Hunter Securities