US shale oil drillers finally cave in as Opec dismisses output cut

New York

US oil drillers are finally beginning to buckle. For more than a year, American oil producers found a way to keep pumping despite a worldwide slide in crude prices. Like the cartoon character Wile E Coyote, US drillers dashed off the cliff and somehow kept running in midair, maintaining volumes even as revenue plummeted.

The companies' latest projections, released in earnings reports in recent days, suggest that gravity is finally taking hold.

Apache Corp expects oil and natural gas production to fall as much as 11 per cent in 2016, the company said on Thursday, a day after Continental Resources Inc projected a 10 per cent cut and Whiting Petroleum Corp a 15 per cent reduction. Devon Energy Corp forecast a 10 per cent decline earlier in the month. EOG…