Southeast Asian farmers have long battled wild monkeys tearing up their fields, devouring their crops and generally creating havoc. But that agriculture community has figured out a way to stop the primates in their tracks. Enter the Indonesian monkey trap. The farmer puts an apple in a cage with a hole just big enough for the monkey’s outstretched hand. Once the monkey grabs the apple, it can’t pull its hand out. The monkey may panic, but it won’t release the apple. It seems to believe that if it just keeps tugging, surely the cage will give way. All the monkey had to do was let go of the apple and it would’ve lived another day. And so it is with some energy companies that effectively “cannibalize” their future earnings instead of cutting their losses. Bob Gray, a partner in the energy transactions practice at Mayer Brown in Houston, used […]