US drillers this week added oil rigs for an eleventh week in the past 12, according to a closely followed report on Friday, although the rate of increases has slowed as crude prices remain below the key $50 a barrel level that spurs a return to the well pad.
That is, however, the longest streak of not cutting rigs since 2011 with the rig count increasing or holding steady every week so far this quarter, Reuters reported.
Drillers added two oil rigs in the week to Sept. 16, bringing the total rig count up to 416, the most since February but still below the 644 rigs seen a year ago, energy services firm Baker Hughes Inc said.
The oil rig count plunged from a record high of 1,609 in October 2014 to a low of 316 in May after crude prices collapsed in the biggest price rout in a generation due to a global oil glut. That decline continued through the first half of this year when drillers cut 206 rigs.
Longer-term analysts expect the rig count to rise slowly for the rest of 2016 before jumping higher over the next two years with a rebalancing of supply and demand.
