Marathon Oil has budgeted $2.4 billion for this year in what it called disciplined total capital budget, which was 11 percent lower than what the company spent last year, Marathon said in the report of its fourth-quarter and full-2019 results. Marathon booked a net profit of $480 million for 2019 and a net loss of $20 million for the fourth quarter, missing analyst estimates, but not unsurprisingly given the oil price environment that has eaten into many of the industry’s profits. While the company reported improvements in well costs and asset sales as it streamlined its operations so that it could focus on core assets at home and a few international locations, the budget for 2020 suggests that Marathon will continue to be careful with spending. This, in turn, highlights the fact that despite lowering production costs in the shale patch, producers are still vulnerable to low prices. The […]