Best Hope is to Keep Company Intact, for nowThe current Canadian oil prices, make this a completely non-viable industry. There won't be a single functioning company in Calgary, if things continue. Thus either we will start to see a sharp rebound, or the industry will just fold up.
You can't sell assets, when the oil price won't cover the total costs. The only hope is to try and develop the best part of the portfolio, that is the closest to sales points. So by going after the US assets, Zargon is trying the hail-Mary pass, to keep afloat.
The current WCS price of $23.24/bbl, is a complete disaster. But has been mentioned, there is some refining capacity down in the US, that will hopefully come back online, shortly. But the transportation bottlenecks have now resulted in the Edmonton Light price, dropping to $34.09/bbl: there shouldn't be a single drilling rig operating in Canada, at these prices.
It is so bad that the big guys, are talking about the need for massive Government intervention, to regulate production, and get a reasonable price for everyone. Always amazing to see how fast Capitalism can turn to Socialism, if things aren't going well:
https://calgaryherald.com/business/energy/varcoe-a-high-stakes-oilpatch-tug-of-war-leaves-notley-government-stuck-in-the-middle?fbclid=IwAR2YmMSO33w1EiJc7bP87VGZ9j3cmSnX6iDQx9RDlf1vNUgVrhrnYX3zC-U
Zargon's only saving grace is that it has no bank debt. You can always regnegotiate with a Debenture Holder, but you can't renegotiate with the Bank. These debentures have been previously extended, and they can get extended again, provided the company has some casfhlow coming in.
But at the current oil prices, nobody has cashflow, therefore nobody will be buying anything. So either these prices get back to more normal levels, or the entire industry might as well pack it in, and I don't think the Government wants to see it, because they need the tax money coming in, to fund all the other programs for people that don't work.
A glimmer of hope with the AECO price, which could also use its own regulation, to stop overproduction of gas, that bottlenecks the poorly run TransCanada system. If we can keep AECO prices at reasonable levels, like this past week saw, then that gives Zargon a bit more cashflow too.