Oil & Gas Rig Counts Falter (OIH, DIG, USO, OIL)

Baker Hughes, Inc. (NYSE: BHI) has released its weekly rig counts and the gains we were seeing look as though they may have started to already peter out.  Throw that in with an almost $3.00 drop to almost $69.00 in NYMEX WTI crude, and we are seeing two of the four key oil ETFs getting whacked.  We have been watching the Oil Services HOLDRs (NYSE: OIH), the Ultra Oil & Gas ProShares (NYSE: DIG), the United States Oil (NYSE: USO) ETF and the iPath S&P GSCI Crude Oil Total Return Index ETN (NYSE: OIL) react to this news.

U.S. Rig Count is down 10 from last week at 999;, but this is down 1032 year over year.

Canadian Rig Count is up 22 from last week at 206, but this is down 227 year over year.

The US Offshore rig count is 34, up 1 from last week, but this is down 40 year over year.

The Oil Services HOLDRs (NYSE: OIH) is actually holding up well and is up 0.4% at $111.70 and the Ultra Oil & Gas ProShares (NYSE: DIG) is also holding up well as shares are ‘only’ down 0.6% at $31.47. The United States Oil (NYSE: USO) ETF is down 4% at $35.88 and the iPath S&P GSCI Crude Oil Total Return Index ETN (NYSE: OIL) is down over 4% at $23.59.

JON C. OGG
September 11, 2009