Canadian oil surge fails to lift producers out of the doldrums

Alberta’s crude curtailment plan has caused a dramatic rise in the price of heavy Canadian oil. But for shares of energy companies, it hasn’t been as much of a help. Since the production curtailment was unveiled early last month, Western Canadian Select crude has almost doubled to about $43 a barrel, narrowing its discount to benchmark US oil to an almost decade-low of $6.95 a barrel on January 11. Yet in that same time, the S&P/TSX Energy Index is up less than 4%.