Premier Oil PMO -5.45 % PLC, one of the U.K.’s biggest independent oil companies, on Thursday reported a wider full-year loss after it wrote down the value of some of its oil and gas fields by just over $1 billion before tax because of the sharp decline in oil prices. It was the second consecutive year that Premier took an impairment on its assets, highlighting the continued pain felt across the energy industry as the oil price rout shows no signs of abating. While the entire oil and gas sector is suffering, the smaller independents that play a key role opening up new regions of the world to oil and gas development, have been at the sharp end of the slumping oil price. Unlike the major oil companies, explorers don’t have other parts of their businesses to fall back on when oil prices are down, such as refining […]