Low natural gas prices contributed to reduced returns on equity (ROE), a measure of profitability, for oil and natural gas producers in 2012, according to EIA analysis. Producers with lower proportions of liquids in their total oil and gas production generally had lower ROE in 2012 compared to 2011, and compared to producers with higher proportions of liquids.
Wide differences in natural gas and oil prices affected the bottom line for upstream operators and shaped their decision-making about where and how to deploy capital. In 2012, wholesale natural gas prices in the United States and Canada fell to their lowest levels in a decade. Crude oil prices, on the other hand, remained at historically high levels.
Some key findings from the analysis show that:
[mappress] May 10, 2013; Source: EIA