• Privately held Dallas-based Classic Reserves Ltd., which sold the assets and stock of Classic Petroleum Inc. earlier this year to XTO Energy Inc. for more than $100 million, has formed Classic Petroleum Resources Inc. to restart an East Texas and Louisiana acquire-and-exploit program. The new company has been funded with some of the sale proceeds, and has Natural Gas Partners private-equity funding as did its predecessor. The start-up already owns development-drilling projects in Carthage, Oak Hill and Overton fields in East Texas and approximately 100 Cotton Valley drilling targets, says Mark Doering, president. The new company can be reached at 972-407-9600. • Resolute Natural Resources Co., Denver, has been formed, with capital from senior management and Natural Gas Partners, to acquire and exploit U.S. producing and associated midstream assets. The company is headed by Nicholas Sutton, co-founder and chief executive of HS Resources prior to its $1.8-billion sale to Kerr-McGee Corp. Other founders include James Piccone, Dale Cantwell, Theodore Gazulis, James Kincaid and Janet Pasque, all former officers of HS Resources, and Richard Betz, formerly a managing director with the oil and gas group at JPMorgan Chase. Betz is vice president, corporate development. The new company can be reached at 609-375-2281. • Dan Pickering, former head of research at Simmons & Co. International, has formed a new independent research firm, Pickering Energy Partners, covering the service and supply sector and macro oil and gas trends. Later, E&P coverage will be added. The other members of the team include Dave Pursell, also a former Simmons analyst; Byron Pope, formerly with a buyside firm; and Jeff Tillery, a former analyst at Simmons as well as a turnaround specialist for Huron Consulting Group. Pickering can be reached at 713-333-2960. • David A. Rice has joined Americrest Bank as a vice president on the energy-lending team in the Dallas office. • Rod Erskine has formed privately held Erskine Energy LLC, focusing on U.S. Gulf Coast and Rocky Mountain gas basins. Previously, he was president of El Paso Production Co., and president of Coastal Oil & Gas Corp. as well as with Nerco Oil & Gas, Union Texas Petroleum and Unocal. He has also joined the board of Canadian Superior Energy Inc., Calgary (Amex, Toronto: SNG).