Chesapeake

A Chesapeake Energy Corp. subsidiary has sold 27 Utica Shale wells and 37,000 net acres in Northeast Ohio and Western Pennsylvania to Geopetro LLC, a Worthington, OH-based legacy producer. Terms of the sale were not disclosed.

Chesapeake Energy Corp. surpassed Wall Street expectations during the third quarter as asset sales and restructured midstream contracts enhanced profits.

The Ohio Supreme Court has decided that landowners that challenge natural gas producers about post-production costs deducted from royalty checks will have to keep heading to trial courts to resolve the issues on a case-by-case basis.

Chesapeake Energy Corp. unveiled a new unconventional resource within Oklahoma’s stacked reservoirs and offered up a renewed zeal to step up in the Powder River Basin, two “game-changers” that are expected to lift oil volumes within the natural gas-heavy portfolio.

Chesapeake Energy Corp. said Thursday it has received subpoenas from the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and some states in connection with an investigation into whether it violated antitrust laws regarding natural gas and oil leasehold purchases, royalty payment practices and accounting methods for acquiring and classifying properties.

Chesapeake Energy Corp. said two of its directors, including a representative of No. 2 investor Carl Icahn, resigned effective Monday, less than a week after Icahn reduced by half his stake in the Oklahoma City-based natural gas producer.

Chesapeake Energy Corp. was rejected again in its bid to avoid paying investors in a bond dispute after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit held for the plaintiff. In a 3-0 ruling the circuit court said the $438.7 million payout, which includes a make-whole payment of $380 million and interest, was justified because Chesapeake waited too long to tell bondholders about a plan to redeem $1.3B of of debt six years early [Chesapeake Energy Corp. v. Bank of New York Mellon Trust Co. NA, No. 15-2366-cv]. The company in February 2012 issued senior notes due on March 15, 2019. On February 20, 2013 Chesapeake said it would redeem the notes, but the Bank of New York Mellon Corp. sued, claiming the time to give notice of redemption at the special price had expired. Under terms of the agreement, Chesapeake had to give 30 days notice, which ended March 15, 2013, less than 30 days before it planned to redeem the bonds. The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in 2015 had ruled for the bank (see Shale Daily,July 10, 2015).

French oil major Total SA has exercised its preferential rights to leapfrog over a prospective buyer and become sole owner and operator of the Barnett Shale leasehold it has co-owned with Chesapeake Energy Corp. since 2009. Meanwhile, Chesapeake is boosting its annual production growth target — even with the Barnett sale — and forecasting cash flow neutrality in 2018.

A federal judge has decided that the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s (AG) royalties lawsuit against Chesapeake Energy Corp. and Anadarko Petroleum Corp. should be heard by a state court.