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Perhaps most stunning: the number of lifelines thrown to troubled oil companies in recent weeks. Investors seem to be worried that they’re going to miss the opportunity to buy at the bottom, to grab a piece of a company that most likely wasn’t generating any free cash flow even when oil was at $100. Maybe the deep pockets that have passed out more than $10 billion in equity and billions more in loans in recent weeks know for a fact that oil prices are about to shoot back up. But I doubt it.

This week Linn Energy announced a $1 billion equity commitment from Quantum QTM 0% Resources, while Whiting Petroleum put to rest the rumors it’s on the auction block by announcing a $1.9 billion equity offering. Encana , which overpaid for Athlon Resources at the top of the market, somehow attracted $1.5 billion in new equity. Laredo Petroleum raised $750 million, Concho Resources $650 million, Oasis Petroleum $400 million and Rosetta Resources $200 million. Even Goodrich Petroleum, its shares down 90% from last year, grabbed $50 million in new equity and sold $100 million in debt. Comstock Resources issued $700 million in new bonds in recent weeks. It’s freshly subordinated debt has plunged in value to trade at a yield of 36%.

Energy XXI managed to sell $1.25 billion in second-lien notes at 12%. In doing so they subordinated their existing $750 million in senior notes. Those notes were trading at a yield of less than 2% last April; now they yield 26% (according to Finra’s TRACE site). Juicy, huh? Only if EXXI survives. Its shares are down 85% from last June, when it paid $2.3 billion to acquire rival EPL Oil & Gas at the peak of the market. Without higher oil prices there’s little chance the company will be able to generate any profits from its vast collection of mature oil fields in the shallow waters of the Gulf of Mexico.

“This is a leading indicator of an underappreciation of risk,” one baffled New York hedge fund manager told me Monday. He’s concerned about the potential devastating effect that a wave of high yield bond defaults and oil company bankruptcies could have on the broader economy.

What's interesting about this company is that it chose to borrow more money instead of issuing stock, despite its massive debt load relative to stockholder equity even before the new debt issue. Some of these natural resource CEO's are like degenerate gamblers.