Beginning in 1963, Quicksilver Resources Inc. built a company that accumulated tens of thousands of acres of land, did billions in deals and accumulated the trappings of a Fort Worth, Texas, oil company: a Persian rug, antique leather chairs and a “Trout in a Beer Glass” painting.
Quicksilver, in bankruptcy since March, is parting with nearly all of its assets pending a ruling Jan. 27 in bankruptcy court to sell to BlueStone Natural Resources II LLC.
Quicksilver auctioned its U.S. oil and gas assets in the Barnett Shale in the Fort Worth Basin and its Delaware Basin assets in Pecos, Crockett and Upton counties in Texas for an all-cash bid of $245 million.
Quicksilver and its subsidiaries marketed its properties for months. By debt, Quicksilver was the third largest E&P bankruptcy of 2015 with about $2.1 billion in secured and unsecured debt, according to analysis of data collected by Haynes and Boone LLP. Quicksilver was the fifth company to file for bankruptcy out of what eventually became 42 cases.
Quicksilver and BlueStone executed a purchase agreement for the sale of the oil and gas assets on Jan. 22. Quicksilver and its U.S. subsidiaries will seek final approval for the sale from the court on Jan. 27. Quicksilver and its U.S. subsidiaries intend to continue normal operations pending the consummation of the sale.
Glenn Darden, president and CEO of Quicksilver, said the marketing and sales process was thorough and resulted in a successful outcome.
“This sale maximizes value for the benefit of our creditors in the face of difficult market condition,” he said.
The company’s West Texas assets include about 200 million barrels of resource potential and encouraging well results, Quicksilver said in September.
In the past 15 years, the company’s largest transaction was its 2008 acquisition of 13,000 net acres in the Barnett Shale for $1.3 billion. In May 2014, the company and other sellers divested 312,000 net acres in the Niobrara Shale in northwest Colorado for $180 million.
Including operations in Canada, Quicksilver’s holdings consisted of 580,000 net acres, proved reserves of 1.2 trillion cubic feet equivalent and 2,000 net producing wells. Quicksilver’s Canadian subsidiary, Quicksilver Resources Canada Inc., is headquartered in Calgary, Alberta.
The assets of Quicksilver’s Canadian subsidiaries were not included in the sale to BlueStone, and a separate marketing process for those assets is underway.
Darren Barbee can be reached at dbarbee@hartenergy.com.
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