Sagging oil prices punish energy sector

While 2014 may be remembered fondly by America's motorists as the year prices at the pump nosedived, oil and gas producers are likely looking forward to putting the year in their rear-view mirror.

The price of benchmark Brent crude dropped to below $57 a barrel on Tuesday, its lowest price in over five years, with abundant global oil supplies continuing to outpace demand.

Oil prices have fallen more roughly 45 percent since June.

Adding to the uncertainly, meanwhile, is a report earlier this month from the International Energy Agency (IEA), slashing its outlook for global oil demand in 2015 to 230,00 barrels a day, down from 900,000, due to lower expectations for Russia and other oil-exporting countries.

Although some oil-dependent nations are finding themselves in political and economic crisis, lower oil prices are also translating into job cuts and project suspensions at many oil companies in the U.S. and Canada.

Shares of Civeo (CVEO), a multinational company that sets up worker lodging at oil production operations in Canada and Australia, on Tuesday plunged more than 50 percent after the company announced it was limiting capital expenditures and suspending its quarterly dividend because of the weaker oil markets.

"The acceleration in November of the decline in global crude oil prices and forecasts for a potentially protracted period of lower prices have resulted in major oil companies reducing their 2015 capital budgets from 2014 levels,"Civeo said in a statement.

"This has had the effect of reducing the near-term allocation of capital to development or expansion projects in the oil sands," it continued, "which is a major driver of demand for the company's services in Canada."