Many companies on the teetering on the brink of insolvency find themselves buried under high interest rates and lack of deployable capital due to low commodity prices. Many banks have cut oil company credit lines as part of the semi-annual review by lenders. But the combined $8.9 billion in debt between the eighteen companies still looms ever menacingly in the background.

Crude oil production in June from the seven major US shale regions is expected to fall 113,000 b/d month-over-month to 4.85 million b/d. Gas production from the regions is forecast to fall 464 MMcfd.

France’s energy and environment minister Segolene Royal wants to find a “legal way” to prevent the import of non-conventional US LNG.

U.S. Rig Count is down 9 rigs from last week to 406, with oil rigs down 10 to 318, gas rigs up 1 to 87, and miscellaneous rigs unchanged at 1. Canadian Rig Count is up 7 rigs from last week to 43, with oil rigs up 5 to 16, gas rigs up 2 to 26, and miscellaneous rigs unchanged at 1.

The United States is deeply concerned about the Nord Stream-2 gas pipeline project as a threat to national security, a senior U.S. energy envoy said on Friday, after the issue was raised at talks in Washington this week.

The pullout comes as crude oil prices have plummeted to less than half their June 2014 levels, forcing oil companies to slash spending. For Shell and ConocoPhillips, the decision to abandon Arctic acreage was formalized just before a May 1 due date to pay the U.S. government millions of dollars in rent to keep holdings in the Chukchi Sea north of Alaska.

If this price drop does happen, then Norway will be caught in the crossfire, as its production is more expensive than Gazprom's. Further, Gazprom has already developed the giant Bovanenkovo field in the Yamal Peninsula, where output has been curtailed as export markets and Gazprom's own domestic demand have have not required the additional gas. This means it is in a position to bring more cheap gas to market at little additional cost beyond transport. For Norway, however, adding more production capacity entails more capital expenditure.

U.S. Rig Count is down 5 rigs from last week to 415, with oil rigs down 4 to 328, gas rigs down 1 to 86, and miscellaneous rigs unchanged at 1. Canadian Rig Count is down 1 rig from last week to 36, with oil rigs up 1 to 11, gas rigs down 2 to 24, and miscellaneous rigs unchanged at 1.

The rout in crude prices is snowballing into one of the biggest avalanches in the history of corporate America, with 59 oil and gas companies now bankrupt after this week's filings for creditor protection by Midstates Petroleum MPOY.PK and Ultra Petroleum UPL.NL.

US commercial crude oil inventories, excluding the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, increased 2.8 million bbl for the week ended Apr. 29 compared with the previous week. The US Energy Information Administration estimated a total of 543.4 million bbl, which is historically high for this time of year.