The latest Bureau of Ocean Energy Management lease sale, which offered drilling rights to nearly 77 million acres in the Gulf of Mexico, attracted about $124.8 million in high bids from 33 companies. That actually only equates to 1% of the 14,431 blocks made available.
In A&D news, Steve Chazen, the former CEO of Occidental Petroleum, will use the $650 million his blank-check company raised in May 2017 to form a pure-play South Texas operator in a $2.66 billion business combination with EnerVest. Chazen’s TPG Pace Energy holdings will carve out EnerVest’s Eagle Ford and Austin Chalk assets to create a new company called Magnolia Oil & Gas, which will trade on the New York Stock Exchange. Magnolia’s assets will consist of EnerVest’s 359,000 net acres in South Texas.
Also in the Eagle Ford, Pioneer Natural Resources recently made headway on its goal of becoming a Permian pure-play with an agreement to sell a portion of its assets in the South Texas shale play to Sundance Energy Australia. Sundance said it had agreed to acquire Eagle Ford assets from Pioneer and its joint venture partner, Reliance Industries, for $221.5.
In addition, the Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported U.S. gas exports beat imports for the first time since 1957. The EIA projects that growth in pipeline exports to Mexico, as well as LNG export capacity, will keep the U.S. as a net exporter of gas every month through the end of 2019.
Sources: