Privately held HighMark Energy is pushing for more Stack with the purchase of 4,095 mostly contiguous acres in a deal with Atalaya Resources LLC, HighMark said June 2.
The assets are mostly in Blaine and Canadian counties, Okla. Offset operators include Continental Resources Inc. (NYSE: CLR), Newfield Exploration (NYSE: NFX) and Cimarex Energy Co. (NYSE: XEC), said Ali Ahmed, president of Irving-based HighMark.
A sizeable number of deals have had the Stack buzzing, including Newfield’s $470 million purchase of 42,000 net acres from Chesapeake Energy Corp. (NYSE: CHK). That doesn’t mean, however, that everyone wants to be there.
Atalaya President and CEO Rob Johnston told Hart Energy that the company has picked up a lot of acreage since the company began operating in early 2015. Johnston said he is not keen on the Scoop Play and bought into the Stack Play practically by accident.
“We think it was good acreage, just noncore for us,” Johnston said, noting that the company has amassed thousands of acres of land elsewhere.
The sales price was not disclosed. In April, Range Resources (NYSE: RRC) sold Stack acreage in Blaine, Canadian and other counties for about $6,000 per acre, after eliminating the value of production.
“EURs, production and IPs on offset wells are in line with what’s in public IR presentations regarding the play,” said HighMark COO Steve Pugh said in a statement
Nevertheless, Johnston and many of his associates at Atalaya previously worked at Apache Corp. (NYSE: APA) before forming Atalaya, where their focus was on western Oklahoma. The company is more interested in sticking to what it knows: generally west of Blaine County.
Johnston, who served as vice president of the company’s Central Region and was a geologist in the Midcontinent in the 1980s, said that commodity prices make for an ideal time to acquire, but prices cut both ways. it remains difficult to find areas that generate sufficient value.
“We still plan on drilling,” Johnston, adding that one well drilled in Elk City, Okla., is in its final stages. Johnston is hopeful the well will produce condensate and oil.
“It’s a struggle to when you want to drill a well with a certain return on investment,” Johnston said.
While lower prices benefit Atalaya, which is able to acquire acreage for a fraction costs, “I don’t want to wish the prices stay low for everybody’s sake.”
“At the same time, it’s an opportunity for us. The lower it stays low the better it is for us,” he said.
Pugh said that the acquired acreage adds “significant acreage positions per section” to its holdings.
“In addition to HighMark’s ground floor leasing program, we are pursuing other highly selective acquisitions in and around our target area and we plan to commence development efforts in the second half of 2016,” he said.
HighMark Resources is backed by Natural Gas Partners and its deal is the second collaboration between the senior executives of HighMark and Natural Gas Partners.
Darren Barbee can be reached at dbarbee@hartenergy.com.
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