In the week ended March 20, the number of rigs drilling for oil in the United States totaled 825, compared with 866 in the prior week and 1,473 a year ago. Including 244 other rigs mostly drilling for natural gas, there are a total of 1,069 working rigs in the country, down 56 week-over-week and 734 year-over-year. The data come from the latest Baker Hughes Inc. (NYSE: BHI) North American Rotary Rig Count.

The number of rigs drilling for oil fell by 648 year-over-year and by 41 week-over-week. The natural gas rig count declined by 15 week-over-week to a total of 242 and is down by 84 year-over-year.

The week-over-week decline in oil rigs was slightly below last week’s total of 64. Since October 10, when the number of oil rigs working in the United States totaled 1,609, the number of oil rigs has dropped by 784, or about 49%.

The April contract for West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude oil expired Friday, but before it did it posted a gain of 1.9% compared with the prior week. The May contract actually lost a bit last week, falling from a closing price of $47.06 a week ago to close Friday at $46.45. The high price for the week was posted Wednesday, at $47.48 a barrel. Also last Wednesday, the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported a crude oil inventory rise of 9.6 million barrels.

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Hedge funds — under the Managed Money heading in the Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s (CFTC) Commitments of Traders report — added about 5,000 contracts to their long positions and about 30,000 short contracts on NYMEX crude. As of March 17, there are about 315,000 long positions among the Managed Money players, compared with 170,000 short positions. Short positions rose sixfold week over week.

Among the producers themselves, short positions outnumber longs, 338,000 to 206,000, and positions among swaps dealers reflect about the same mix. Producers added to short positions in the week to March 17, while swaps dealers added to their long positions.

The states losing the most rigs were Texas (down 36), followed by Louisiana (down 18) and New Mexico (down five). Alaska lost four and North Dakota and Ohio each lost three. West Virginia and Pennsylvania each added three rigs last week, while Colorado and Oklahoma added two each and California added one.

In the Permian Basin of west Texas and southeastern New Mexico, the rig count dropped by 19 to bring the total down to 292. The Eagle Ford Basin in south Texas lost eight rigs and now has 138 working, and the Williston Basin (Bakken) in North Dakota and Montana has 99 working rigs, down five from the prior week.

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As of Friday, the posted price for Williston Basin sweet crude had increased from $28.44 a barrel a week ago to $29.44, and Williston Basin sour rose from $19.33 a barrel to $20.33 a barrel. Eagle Ford Light crude sold for $42.25 a barrel, up from $441.25 on the previous Friday, the same price as WTI. About half of last week’s increases came on Friday as the dollar lost strength against the euro.

The price of gasoline continues to slip. Saturday morning’s average price in the United States is $2.424 a gallon, down from $2.435 a week ago.

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