據美國彭博新聞社2022年8月12日報道，美國頁巖鉆井公司的債務負擔在第二季度進一步下降，這表明他們如今有額外的現金來支付股息、回購股票或進行資產收購。

在石油和天然氣生產商中，一項通常用來衡量企業償還貸款能力的指標普遍有所改善，因為這些公司回購了一些債券，并在利潤不斷膨脹的情況下囤積現金。彭博新聞社日前公布的統計數據顯示，包括康菲公司和先鋒自然資源公司在內的美國一批獨立頁巖鉆井公司公布的第二季度凈債務與扣除利息和稅收等項目的年度收益的平均比例不到0.6倍，低于去年同期的大約1.7倍。

彭博情報（Bloomberg Intelligence）分析師斯賓塞?卡特表示：“許多油氣勘探和生產企業已經達到或正在迅速接近其債務目標。”“與2015年或2020年崩盤時相比，能源企業在修復和強化資產負債表方面已經取得了很大進展，如今它們在應對大宗商品價格再次下跌方面的地位要強大得多。”

在疫情暴發之前，頁巖公司是油氣產量增長的引擎，因為投資者將資金投入該行業。疫情的暴發大幅削減了石油需求，壓低了油價，迫使許多能源公司要么破產，要么停產。由于需求從2020年的崩潰中恢復，如今許多頁巖鉆井公司對此謹慎應對，適度增加產量，并優先考慮回報投資者。

李峻 編譯自 美國彭博新聞社

原文如下：

Substantial shale profits free up more cash to reward investors

Shale drillers saw their debt burden fall further in the second quarter, signaling extra room for them to pay dividends, buy back shares or make acquisitions.

A metric commonly used to measure companies’ ability to pay down their borrowings has widely improved among oil and gas producers as they repurchase some bonds and pile up cash amid ballooning profits. Net debt reported by a group of independent drillers including ConocoPhillips and Pioneer Natural Resources Co. averaged less than 0.6 time their annual earnings before items such as interest and taxes in the second quarter, down from roughly 1.7 time a year earlier, Bloomberg data show.

“Many E&Ps have reached, or are very quickly approaching, their debt target,” said Spencer Cutter, an analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence. “Energy companies have come a long way toward repairing and reinforcing their balance sheets and are in a much stronger position today to handle another downturn in commodity prices than they were going into the 2015 or 2020 crashes.” 

Prior to the pandemic, shale companies were engines of production growth as investors plowed money into the sector. The onset of Covid decimated oil demand and cratered prices, forcing many companies either into bankruptcy or to shut in production. As demand recovers from the 2020 collapse, many shale drillers have responded cautiously, increasing output moderately and prioritizing