Highlights From the Newfield Earnings Transcript

Link here.

Regarding the Bakken:

In the Bakken play, our operations are gaining steam after our brief slowdown in late 2011. This slowdown allowed us to reduce the backlog of uncompleted wells and improve our execution in the field. From the beginning of the year, we have completed 8 new wells. The average initial production rate from these wells was more than 2,600 barrels of oil equivalent per day. With the exception of one well, these were all super extended lateral wells. The one 5,000 foot lateral was actually one of the higher IP rates at nearly 3,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day. We expect that our Bakken production will grow about 35% over our 2011 levels.

Our drilling team is transitioning our operations to pad-based drilling in 2012. About 2/3 of our planned wells in the Bakken will be from multi-well pads. Our most recent laterals, 11,000 feet in total length with up to 40 frac stages, have been drilled in as few as 24 days. This compares to an average of 35 days in 2011 and more than 40 days in 2010. We've also reduced the number of days between rig release and first production, from 62 days in 2011 to about 40 to 45 days year-to-date.

The very first question: how much is a Bakken well costing Newfield? So in general, I'd say we're sitting at about 640 acres, somewhere around $6.9 million or so completed on a 12 80; 10,000-, 11,000 foot lateral, somewhere around $11 million or so.