Bear market for oil sector drills energy stocks

The bear market in the oil patch is causing big pain for energy companies.

Half of the stocks in the S&P Energy sector are down more than 20% or more this year and in personal bear markets of their own.

In a sign of just how much pain the latest plunge in the price of crude oil is having on energy-related stocks, with only two of the 34 stocks in the sector are now sporting gains for the year, S&P Dow Jones Indices data show.

That means 32, or 94% of the stocks in the sector, are in the red in 2017. The energy sector, which is down 15% this year, is the worst-performing sector in the S&P 500 stock index.

Woes in energy are just the latest headwind for the broad U.S. stock market, which has been dealing with a recent pullback in once high-flying tech stocks.

The pain in the energy sector is mounting, with shares of 10 companies down more than 30%.

The biggest loser? Transocean. The offshore oil and gas driller is down nearly 47%. The other names down more than 30% are Range Resources, Chesapeake Energy, Anadarko Petroleum, Devon Energy, Hess, Marathon Oil, Cimarex Energy, Helmerich & Payne and Newfield Exploration.

More than 85% of the companies in the S&P 500 energy sector are down 10% or more in 2017, a sign of broad weakness.

“Oil investors don’t like what they see: too much supply and not enough demand,” said Edward Yardeni, chief investment strategist at Yardeni Research.

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