Oil And Gas Industries Continue Downward Spiral

Six Industry Leaders Declare Financial Distress in Less Than Two Weeks

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May 24, 2016, 11:25 ET

ALLENTOWN, Pa., May 24, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Creditsafe USA, the world's most used supplier of company business intelligence, today released troubling statistics about the volatile oil and gas sectors. Featured in the Creditsafe Oil and Gas Sector Report, this analysis examines the key financial metrics of an industry where six major companies have declared massive financial problems in less than two weeks. With five companies filing for Chapter 11 protection—Breitburn Energy Partners, Intervention Energy, LLC., Linn Energy, Pennsylvania Virginia Corp., and Sand Ridge Energy—and Seventy Seven Energy, Inc. declaring financial restructuring, the future of this significant US industrial market is unclear.

"Our study examines the fundamentals of the sector's two primary areas—extraction and support activities. Each of these areas has experienced significant financial turmoil over the past several months with no sign of improvement. Many companies have seen a massive decline in their credit rating as a result of paying bills later while racking up enormous amounts of debt. The oil and gas industries have a rough road ahead of them with no clear path for stability," said Matthew Debbage, president of Creditsafe's American and Asia-Pacific Operations.

Creditsafe's Oil and Gas Sector Analysis focuses on companies with a NAICS of 211111(Crude Petroleum and Natural Gas Extraction) and 213112 (Support Activities for Oil and Gas Operations). Over the past three months, there have been several significant developments:

CREDIT RATINGS:
**48% of companies in the Oil & Gas sector have seen a significant decrease in their credit rating

**Companies with a decreased credit rating experienced an average rating decline of 15 points — from 52.62 to 36.82

**Companies in the oil and gas industries are paying their bills 25% later in May 2016 than in February 2016. The total number of payment days beyond terms has increased from 5.8 days to 7.3 days

PAYMENT DATA:
**Over 20% of companies in the oil & gas sector have seen a significant negative change in payment days beyond terms

**For companies with negative payment behavior, the average number of days beyond terms has increased from 5.1 days to 36.2 days

Oil and Gas Industry Snapshot:
**Oil and gas industry consists of approximately 22,000 companies with over 4.75 million employees

**Sixty oil and gas companies have filed for bankruptcy since 2014

**Bankruptcies in this sector are expected to sextuple in 2016 according to Deloitte

**Eleven oil and gas companies filed for bankruptcy in April 2016 with an accumulated debt of $14.9 billion

About The Creditsafe Group
The Creditsafe Group is the world's most used supplier of company business intelligence, with ten Creditsafe Group reports downloaded every second. Privately owned and independently minded, Creditsafe is looking to change the way business Information is used by providing high-quality data in an easy to use format that everyone in an organization can benefit from.

Founded in Norway in 1997, The Creditsafe Group has offices in countries all over the world including: the UK, Germany, France, Sweden, Ireland, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands and the United States. Globally, Creditsafe employs over 1,200 people and has more than 90,000 subscription customers. Three years ago, the Creditsafe Group opened offices in the U.S. under the name Creditsafe USA. Its U.S. operations are headquartered in Allentown, Pa. with another facility in Phoenix, AZ. For more information, please visit www.creditsafe.com.