Biology of Business

LNG Energy

Oil & Gas · Founded 2005 · Defunct 2016

By Alex Denne

LNG Energy's 2016 bankruptcy illustrates how commodity price collapse can instantly kill highly-leveraged exploration companies. The natural gas producer's debt service became impossible when prices dropped below extraction costs. Like an organism whose metabolic rate exceeds food availability during winter, LNG couldn't reduce costs fast enough when revenue collapsed. The company exemplifies hundreds of energy bankruptcies during the 2015-2016 oil/gas price crash.

Key Facts

2005
Founded