Weekly Roundup – Continental Still Upbeat

Posted by bakken

Oil bounced off its short term low last week and is currently a bit below $83. European debt issues are still in the forefront, but the most investors backed off the panic selling we saw a week ago. Similarly, Bakken plays also bounced off their 52 week lows, but most are still down over 40% in 2011. Despite the poor stock performance, there continues to be a number of promising developments for oil & gas companies in the region. The latest are listed below.

• Oil company Continental Resources (CLR: 77.50 +8.68%)  expects full-year production to be at the high end of its outlook for a 39 percent increase thanks to a strong third-quarter performance.  Continental Resources completed 45 gross operated wells in the Bakken oil field of North Dakota & Montana in the quarter.    This was a 30% increase over the prior quarter.

• Department of Mineral Resources Director Lynn Helms said Thursday at the North Dakota Association of Oil and Gas Producing Counties annual meeting in Medora.  “We think it is going to go up for the next four years,” Helms said. “There is no real evidence of a slow down in this thing.”    North Dakota was producing 440,000 barrels a day in August, according to Helms. While some counties may not produce as much as others, Helms predicted that North Dakota could produce up to 800,000 barrels a day by the end of 2011.

• About $3 billion worth of infrastructure projects are on the drawing boards in North Dakota’s Bakken Shale play to monetize the natural gas produced in association with oil, which otherwise would be lost to flaring, operators and state officials said in interviews.   About 134,000 Mcf/d, or almost one third of the gas produced in North Dakota, is flared because of the lack of infrastructure to take the gas away or otherwise monetize it, Bruce Hicks, assistant director of the Oil and Gas Division of the North Dakota Industrial Commission said in an interview Monday.

	Company name	Price	Change	Chg %	P/E ratio	Mkt Cap
BEXP	Brigham Exploration Co.	25.70	-0.55	-2.10%	35.62	3.02B
CLR	Continental Resources,…	49.88	-0.01	-0.02%	101.35	9.00B
NOG	Northern Oil & Gas, Inc.	18.79	-0.37	-1.93%	91.73	1.19B
WLL	Whiting Petroleum Corp.	35.54	-1.46	-3.95%	14.74	4.17B

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Brigham Exploration and Continental Resources looking attractive here

Posted by bakken

It’s been a tough 2 weeks for oil with a flurry of news causing massive volatility and ultimately sending Bakken stocks down about 5-10% since the beginning of May.      A number of factors including supply/demand concerns, margin requirements and rumors of Gaddafi being wounded (and possibly ousted)  leading to the net decline.   In looking at 2 major players in the Bakken region,  Brigham Exploration (BEXP: 0.00 N/A) and Continental Resources (CLR: 77.50 +8.68%) ,  there are some strong technical indicators that we will see a bounce.    Continental is down about 15% from its 52 week high earlier this year and Brigham is down almost 28% from its 52 week high.   Both companies have met earnings expectations, although one could argue that Brigham didn’t beat expectations as much as expected to match their lofty growth expectations on the street.

In taking a closer look at both charts below,   both CLR and BEXP should see major support very close to current PPS  ($27 for BEXP,  $60 for CLR)  and both are at the lower Bollinger Band which can also be interpreted as a level of support  (Bollinger Bands is an indicator of  relative price performance against a stocks short term historical performance).   Fundamentals are still intact for both companies with Brigham getting a reiterated Buy rating and a price target of $41 from Jefferies last week.   We agree with this sentiment and expect a short term bounce of at least 5% for both CLR and BEXP  in the next month.

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