One of the biggest struggles for a rig or an oil services company is to have outdated and legacy assets on its books, and Nabors Industries (NBR -0.65%) is finding itself in that very position. With its legacy rigs running at an awful utilization rate of 39% and its offshore rigs running at 55% at a time when more than 95% of the global marketed jack-up fleet is in use, Nabors has lots of older assets dragging on the balance sheet. To compound the problem, its smaller oil services business in America is in some of the most flooded parts of the market like pressure pumping. Unlike some of the larger oil services companies like Halliburton (HAL 0.34%) and Schlumberger (SLB -0.89%), though, Nabors doesn't have a diverse enough oil services business to take the hits in that part of the business without it severely impacting earnings.
While the company has some tricks up its sleeve to boost earnings in the short term, there is only one real way out of this lull for Nabors: its PACE-X Rig. Tune into the video below to find out why this top-of-the-line rig is the way to more profitable days in the future.
