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Exxon Mobile (NYSE:XOM) has filed a request for an environmental license for a fracking project, which would make it the first company to step into the much commented space in Colombia.

Ecopetrol (NYSE:EC) has announced more cost cutting measures, one of its main strategies to keep the company profitable. The cuts will affect not just contractors but its staff, and comes as ECP’s stock falls to historic lows.

The oil prices crisis has caused a reduction of 40,000 jobs in the Colombian labor market, according to the study “Guide for the 2015 labor market” performed by Hays and EY. The restructuring of the sector has reached 63% in the first nine months of the year, the study says.

ANH President Mauricio de la Mora was practically exuberant at a ceremony in the ANH’s offices on Wednesday. And why not? Canacol (TSX:CNE) and ConocoPhillips (NYSE:COP) were signing the agency’s first additional unconventional contract and victory had been snatched from the jaws of defeat.

Ecopetrol (NYSE:EC) held a shareholders meeting in Medellín and said that it would strengthen its exploration activities abroad, setting an investment goal per year of US$1.25B on average, destined for the Gulf of Mexico, Peru, Brazil and Colombia’s offshore blocks.

The Colombian country manager  of Gas Natural Fenosa, González Santos, said that the supply of natural gas is assured and the matter is “not so complicated”, but the country must be ready to import gas when the hydro-electric grid is short on water.

Ecopetrol (NYSE:EC) president Juan Carlos Echeverry said in a recent interview that the NOC’s cost cutting measures have been effective and its profits have fallen less than the global average due to the fall in oil prices. Even if the price of crude falls to US$30/barrel, and he says he will pray it does not, the company would remain profitable.

The Colombian State Council found that the firm Gran Tierra Energy Colombia (TSX: GTE) has failed to meet the terms of a contract with Ecopetrol (NYSE:EC) and therefore owes the state oil firm CoP$6.2B (US$2M).

Thousands of Colombians invested their savings in Ecopetrol (NYSE:EC) following its market debut in 2007. Those that did not sell off at its peak have been left to watch their investment’s value shrink, and in early November the NOC’s stock fell below its IPO value on the Bogotá exchange. What options do these small investors have to recovery their lost value?

Ecopetrol (NYSE:EC) says it has finished a demonstration plant in Chichimene in the Meta Department which uses a technology to lighten heavy and extra heavy crudes, allowing them to be shipped in pipelines while cutting the company’s need to purchase naphtha as a diluent.