Oilfield Srvs Co Weatherford in Financial Trouble
Weatherford International is the fourth largest oilfield services company in the world, employing some 44,000 people. They have a branch office in Canonsburg, PA (Pittsburgh area) with major operations in the Marcellus/Utica. By comparison, Weatherford competitor Halliburton is the #2 largest oilfield services company in the world. A strange thing happened to Weatherford in September 2015. The public company floated new shares of stock and new IOUs (i.e., convertible notes) hoping to raise $1 billion in cash. But a few hours after they announced the offering, they withdrew it because “while investor interest was strong for this offering” the price those investors were willing to pay for the new stock and notes was not anywhere near what Weatherford wanted (see Oilfield Services Weatherford Flip Flops on Stock/Note Offering). Needless to say the company's stock got hammered. Things didn't improve. Weatherford has a branch office in Buckhannon, WV. In July they announced the company would lay of 147 positions in the Buckhannon office by the end of August (see Heartbreak: Weatherford, ECA Lay Off Combined 175 Jobs in WV). A stock analyst writing on the Seeking Alpha website offers evidence that Weatherford is insolvent and will either have to do an "equity raise" (wiping out existing shareholders) or continue to burn through the remaining cash it has and go belly up sometime next year...
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