Reuters Predicts Minimal Decrease In Shale Production Month-Over-Month -- January 11, 2016

If this turns out to be accurate -- that US shale production falls 120,000 bopd month-over-month -- as reported by Reuters/Rigzone -- that's trivial. Even if the entire decrease was due to the Bakken/North Dakota, it wouldn't be remarkable. If the 120,000 bopd is spread across the Bakken, the Eagle Ford, and the Permian (not to include the half-dozen other shale plays, the decrease is exceedingly trivial -- considering.

Reuters/Rigzone is reporting:

U.S. shale oil production is expected to fall for a seventh month in a row in February, declining at about the same rate as the month before as drillers manage to eke out a few more barrels from each new well, U.S. data showed on Monday.

Total output was set to decline by 116,000 bpd to 4.8 million bpd in February compared with January, a U.S. Energy Information Administration's (EIA) drilling productivity report said. Production was estimated to have fallen by about the same margin in January, despite some expectations that the decline rate would begin to quicken as companies slash spending.

If true, the decline would take U.S. shale output to 638,000 bpd below the March 2015 peak, a far slower drop than many analysts had expected just a few months ago.

Shale firms' resilience in the face of crashing crude oil markets has added to the selloff, pushing prices to near 13-year lows this week.

Bakken production from North Dakota and Montana was set to fall 24,000 bpd, while production from the Eagle Ford in South Texas was expected to fall 72,000 bpd. But some regions were still growing, 18 months into the oil slump.

Production was forecast to rise by 5,000 bpd in the Permian Basin in West Texas and eastern New Mexico, the data showed.

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Future Xylophonist