As they say in football, watch out for the deep routes. The same goes for the U.S. Gulf.
There’s been plenty of bad news lately related to the so-called “new era of austerity” as analyst G. Allen Brooks calls it. Sure, it looks like ExxonMobil, Shell, BP and others will reduce their capital expenditures, but most think this is just a bump in the road — a “short-term softness” rather a major slowdown.
As Bill Pike reports in our cover story on page 52, interest in the U.S. Gulf is still strong, especially in deepwater. The evidence was in March’s federal lease sale of 329 Gulf tracts covering some 1.71 million acres that brought in over $872 million in high bids. The bids confirm an ongoing and robust market potential in the Gulf.
Jez Averty, senior vice president for North America exploration for Statoil, told WorkBoat that the prospects in the deepwater Gulf “rank highly in global prioritization” of the company’s portfolio. “It’s the value creation potential of this basin that drives us to explore.”
Statoil and most of the major oil and gas operators are working in the deepwater Gulf. As a result, the supply of deepwater rigs is increasing.
And while we may indeed see the effects of the reduced capex budgets in the future, the offshore market for the rest of this year and into 2015 should be steady.
At our OSV Design & Technology regional summit held in Houston in late March, Richard Sanchez, senior marine specialist for IHS PetrodataMarineBase, said the near-term outlook also looks positive for the OSV market. In mid-2015, a lot of newbuilds will be entering the market. However, Sanchez is not overly concerned about overbuilding, especially for the bigger high-specification newbuilds.
Sanchez said the term “overbuild” is relative. It all depends on where you are in the market. Overall, Sanchez said, if you are a large OSV operator, the world looks good, and you should see “four to five quarters of good revenues” for your fleet.
If you have long-term contracts locked in at decent rates, things will be smoother, especially if you have those big, new boats.
