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In the last 18 months, other top service firms, including the world’s top oilfield services company Schlumberger, added or acquired new hydraulic fracturing fleets in a bet that a backlog of uncompleted shale wells would grow their businesses.

But across the U.S. the number of yet-to-be-fracked wells hit 8,289 in May, up 22% in a year, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

Oil and gas employment in the United States has grown since the last downturn, but last month remained 20% below the same month in 2014, according to U.S. government data.

Some investors and executives believe a wave of mergers and restructurings will be required to prop up declining margins.

“There’s just frankly too many players,” Roe Patterson, CEO of Fort Worth, Texas-based Basic Energy Services Inc, said of the oilfield services industry in May.

“Everyone understands that trying to reduce our cost structure is not going to be how we improve and fix the OFS (oilfield service) space. We’ve got to see a shrinking number of bidders and competitors out there.”

CAN MERGERS FIX MARGIN PRESSURE?

Profits for service companies that added people and equipment following the 2015-2016 oil price collapse also have suffered. Oilfield equipment utilization fell nearly 13 points and profitability tumbled 26 points versus the previous quarter, according a June survey by the Dallas Federal Reserve bank. Its survey polled 60 oilfield service companies in Texas, New Mexico and Louisiana.