Houston-based Swift Energy Co. increased its third quarter production 12% over the same period a year ago, and set a quarterly production record, with 13.6 Bcfe, which included 8.7 Bcfe domestically and 4.9 Bcfe for production in New Zealand. The independent also was up 3% sequentially from the second quarter.

With higher production and higher commodity prices, Swift improved its net income 263% from last year’s third quarter, to $17.1 million (26 cents/share), compared with $1.9 million (7 cents/share). Total revenue was $51.6 million, a 41% increase over last year’s quarterly total of $36.6 million.

“One of the major accomplishments this year is the completion of significant facility capacity upgrades in the Lake Washington Field, which will expand our facility capacity to more than 20,000 boe/d,” said CEO Terry Swift. “We are on course to achieve approximately 7-9% production growth this year. Based upon our current drilling program for 2004, we expect production to grow at a rate of 10-15% next year, driven predominately by growth in Lake Washington and New Zealand.”

Domestic production in the quarter was up 9% to 8.7 Bcfe from last year’s 8.1 Bcfe. Crude oil accounted for 52% of domestic volumes, with 36% coming from natural gas and 12% from natural gas liquids. Combined production volumes for the third quarter from both domestic and New Zealand activities were 49% natural gas, 40% crude oil and 11% natural gas liquids.

Swift successfully drilled 13 of 17 wells domestically in the third quarter, with 12 development wells and five exploration wells. In Lake Washington, the Company successfully drilled nine of 11 development wells and with a 100% success rate on three exploration wells. In other operated areas, Swift had a successful development well in the Wilcox sands in South Texas, which is expected to be completed and placed on production during fourth quarter 2003, but had two unsuccessful exploration wells in the Garcia Ranch area. For the first nine months of 2003, the company has successfully drilled 45 out of 55 domestic wells.

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