Panhandle reports net loss for quarter

Panhandle Oil and Gas reported Monday that it posted a quarterly net loss of $775,093 for three months that ended June 30.

Earnings were affected by a $2.129 million loss on its derivative contracts for the period, where oil prices were higher than what previously had been projected, the Oklahoma City company said.

The company’s leadership touted several achievements it had made during the firm’s fiscal year, which started Oct. 1. Those included:

• Boosting total production for the first nine months of its fiscal year by 19 percent, compared to the same period in its fiscal 2017.

• Generating a ninemonth net income of about $14 million, compared to a net income of about $2.5 million, year-over-year.

• Generating free cash flow during the ninemonth period of about $13.9 million, even after spending about $7.5 million to drill and complete wells.

Officials said they also had lowered the firm’s lease operating expense and reduced the company’s debt from $52.2 million on Sept. 30 to $40.4 million on June 30.

Plus, they also said the percentage of oil and natural gas liquids the company is producing from its wells continues to climb.

“The company is continuing to deploy a majority of capital into low-risk drilling projects in the Eagle Ford, STACK and SCOOP,” Paul F. Blanchard Jr., Panhandle’s president and chief executive, stated in the earnings release.