Coming off a rather abysmal week for oil prices, Baker Hughes reported a 3-rig increase for oil and gas in the United States this week. The total number of active oil and gas drilling rigs now stands at 1,083 according to the report, with the number of active oil rigs increasing by 2 to reach 885 and the number of gas rigs increasing by 1 to 198. The oil and gas rig count is now 154 up from this time last year, 138 of which is in oil rigs. WTI prices were up slightly on Friday following a uneventful EIA report which showed US crude oil inventories were virtually unchanged for the week, contrary to Thursday’s API report which showed a surprise crude oil inventory build. Brent crude was trading slight down on Friday, at $52.44 (-0.55%) The WTI benchmark was trading up 0.29% (+$0.13) at $44.74, still down […]