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“The sentiment in the industry is very poor right now,” said Myles Bosman, vice-president, exploration and chief operating officer at Birchcliff Energy Ltd.

To illustrate the problem, Bosman noted that his company’s share price is currently trading at a multiple of four times its cash flow, whereas it has historically traded at eight times its cash flow.

In dollar terms, the company’s shares traded at $3.80 per share on Tuesday. Prior to the oil price crash of 2014, Birchcliff shares traded in the $13 and $14 per share range.

B.C.-focused Painted Pony Energy Ltd. president and CEO Pat Ward said he paid more in carbon taxes in 2018 than he did in royalties, which is an indication of the additional costs the Canadian industry faces in comparison with the U.S. industry.

Share prices and trading volumes in Canadian oil and gas names have fallen to a level where even some mid-sized companies “are now beginning to slip below liquidity thresholds for some larger funds,” said Tudor, Pickering, Holt and Co. analyst Jordan McNiven.

McNiven said that oil and gas commodity prices have become more volatile driving away major funds who are looking to invest in companies with sizeable trading volume and liquidity.

The need for size and scale would likely not cause smaller companies to merge with each other, but it could lead renewed investor interest among larger funds, he said.

Painted Pony Energy Ltd. president and CEO Pat Ward said that he did an acquisition in 2017 and, as a result his “stock got pounded.”