Well, well. The ship of state has a new captain, but we don’t yet know where he plans to sail. Will he keep everything shipshape, and protect our production progress? How much can he limit or overturn regulations and policies that adversely affect the industry?

At press time, political, financial and oil industry pundits were still trying to answer these questions and figure out whether Donald Trump’s victory will create meaningful changes in energy. That the new president is a businessman and entrepreneur could be an advantage. For one thing, he is used to working fast and making things happen (he frequently touts that his new buildings and golf courses come in on time and under budget). He will have a Republican House and Senate at his back too, a big plus after years of frustrating obstructionism that permeated the federal government.

In the first days after the election, oil and gas spokesmen pledged to work with Trump, saying they thought he would be good for the industry. They cited his America First Energy Plan. In various speeches before the vote, including in North Dakota, Trump had promised to remove unnecessary regulations and end the “war on coal” and U.S. dependence on oil imports from OPEC.

Jack Gerard, API president and CEO, reminded us of what is at stake when he presented results from the organization’s Election Day poll. “Eighty percent of voters support increased development of U.S. oil and natural gas resources, including 71% of Democrats, 94% of Republicans and 76% of independents,” said Gerard.

“Seventy-seven percent of voters say they support a national energy policy that ensures a secure supply of abundant, affordable and available energy for the American people in an environmentally responsible manner. That description serves both as a good summary of what the American energy revolution is accomplishing, and as a guiding principle for the next administration’s energy policy,” he said.

Gerard said the industry is dealing with 145 regulations or other policy-setting activities that could discourage production, “so preventing regulatory overreach should be a top priority.”

In September, Scientific American reported that Trump was rumored to have chosen a noted climate change skeptic, Myron Ebell, to lead his EPA transition team. The director of the Center for Energy & Environment at a conservative think tank, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, Ebell was threatened by the British Parliament with censure after he criticized the U.K.’s chief scientific advisor on global warming.

Wall Street generally cheered the election results, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average going up smartly. Crude oil rose about 45 cents/bbl the day after the election but backed off by the same amount the day after that, with macro supply and demand projections from the International Energy Agency and OPEC being the more relevant drivers in any case.

Piper Jaffray’s co-head of research, Bill Hebert, said in a report, “The Trump ascendancy is, at first blush, bullish [on] domestic oil and gas with respect to supporting a deregulated and unfettered growth agenda (what this means for market balances is another matter—ditto market risk premium).”

The Robert W. Baird researchers said, “In our view, the Trump presidency likely nets positive for North American oil-weighted producers and midstreamers, but possibly negative for natural gas prices as coal makes a comeback. A course correction back toward fossil fuel usage likely manifests itself through reduced federal interference across multiple agencies.”

Regardless of who occupies the White House or becomes energy secretary, in the end it is primarily oil and gas prices and access to capital that dictate the level of drilling and A&D deal flow.

For now, the industry looks set to keep adding rigs through 2017 and continue recovering from the stunning spending lows seen in the past two years. Of the roughly 65 E&Ps tracked by Cowen & Co., “we estimate a 48% spending decline in 2016. For 2017 we have 17 updates [so far, from specific companies] averaging a 33% year-over-year spending increase,” Cowen analyst Mark Bianchi said.

“There’s never been a bigger resource on the planet” than we now find in the U.S. shales and horizontally drilled oil fields, according to Allen Gilmer, CEO of Drillinginfo, who spoke recently in Houston. “If we quit drilling today, it’s the sweet, high-gravity crudes that would be hurt. Oil production would drop some, but at $55 there is no real decline in U.S. production.”

Gilmer said his projection is based on current production, type curves and technology trends, and assumes that the quality of new wells doesn’t improve.

But, he said, since 2014, oil wells have been getting better by 15% to 20%, and gas wells just a bit stronger too. All thanks to technology, which will sail ahead no matter who is in the Oval Office.

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