re: Oil stocks...are you buying?

Possibly some overreaction. Lower oil prices help some companies downstream operations. CVX for one. I've bought CVX, and will continue to, slowly and selectively. From my entry point it hasn't deteriorated much. It very well could. Management has said they will do everything they can to keep paying their dividend. They increased it a while back IIRC. Their current yield, lower than a lot of others, is somewhat a testament to their discipline during the good times. I think it's at about 5%. Honestly don't really pay much attention to CVX, except for strategic buys on occasion as my concern is very low.

I've lost track of rig count, but really for a buy and hold, a lot of oil companies don't warrant all of the worry they seem to be causing. Some frakers are making it right now at present price levels. This entire thing has caused the capex costs to become very, very attractive to companies taking a different approach. Even some smaller, riskier companies have ramped down, make shrewd debt offerings, and are plowing everything they can into exploratory wells given the barian prices for leasing the equipment etc.

The downturn in the market has caused me no concern. I'm not down this year due to VIX insurance, and haven't sold anything. Nothing has gone belly up on me (yet). If it dire, it gets dire. Nothing I can do about it except try to position the best I can, and part of that is that I'm not scared of oil companies right now.