Berry Petroleum Company (BRY) - Permian Basin shale Update

By Andrea: http://oilshalegas.com

Berry Petroleum Company (BRY) announced that it has entered into agreements with a group of sellers to acquire their interests in properties on approximately 9,300 net acres in the Wolfberry trend (Permian Basin) in West Texas for a combined purchase price of $180 million in cash. Berry's proved plus probable reserve estimates associated with the forty-acre development of the properties are approximately 35 million barrels of oil equivalent (MMBOE) with crude oil comprising 76% of these volumes. Upon completion of the acquisitions, the properties are expected to add approximately 2,200 barrels of oil equivalent per day (BOED) to Berry's production during 2011.

Since entering the Permian basin in March of 2010, Berry has accumulated approximately 19,350 net acres in the Wolfberry trend. The $313 million of acquisitions in 2010 is expected to provide a five-year drilling inventory in the Wolfberry of 400 locations on forty-acre spacing with an additional 400 potential locations on twenty-acre spacing.

Robert Heinemann, president and chief executive officer, stated, "We are pleased to bring additional scalable, high margin oil assets into the portfolio which complements our base oil assets in California and Utah. We believe these acquisitions enhance our overall Permian operations with a contiguous 6,800 net acre block and strong per well recoveries of 180 MBOE. The first three years of expected production on these assets has a hedging floor of approximately $87 WTI which should allow these assets to generate operating margins of $62 per barrel. The Company's existing Wolfberry assets, acquired earlier in 2010, are performing in line with expectations and production is 1,700 BOED today. With the acquisitions announced today, we now expect production from our Permian assets will grow to 9,000 BOED during the next four years."

David Wolf, executive vice president and chief financial officer, stated "We expect to fund this acquisition under our credit facility and on a pro forma basis we will have liquidity of over $500 million. With this acquisition, our leverage should be in the range of 2.25 to 2.5 times EBITDA in 2011."

The effective date of the transaction is October 1, 2010 with closing expected in December 2010 and is subject to customary closing conditions. Production from the properties to be acquired is expected to be approximately 1,200 BOED at closing. Contribution to the Company's fourth quarter 2010 production will be minimal given the expected closing date.

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