Canadian oil and gas firms realize growth by more production

Canadian oil and natural gas companies benefited from robust oil and gas prices and continued growth through production in the second quarter, according to a report released by Standard & Poor's Ratings Services.
Canada's exploration and production companies also have started to realize production growth from recently completed projects, international operations, and increased drilling activity, S&P reported.

"As conventional domestic reserves continue to decline, we expect Canadian oil and gas companies will increasingly look to international regions for future reserve replacements," said S&P's credit analyst Michelle Dathorne. "Although international areas will generally provide large-scale reserve additions with competitive production economics, these assets introduce greater political risks to the companies' credit profiles and are generally subject to fairly onerous fiscal terms," said S&P.
"Still, overall credit quality continued to benefit from strong hydrocarbon prices and increasing production," S&P reported, adding that it expects these positive fundamentals to continue to bolster Canadian oil and gas companies' credit profiles in the second half.