Newfield May Be The Best Producer In The Bakken -- Filloon -- April 18, 2018

Link over at SeekingAlpha.

• improving well productivity is being seen across all US plays, and some operators have done a better job of this than others
• NFX 2017 locations produced the most oil, followed by MRO and OAS
• the majority of NFX 2017 horizontals will produce more than 200 MBO in the first year of well life, with several over 300 MBO

Newfield has always been one of the better operators with respect to well design. It has had other issues, but it has been ahead of the technological curve. Well design and oil production is just one of many variables to consider, but it is extremely important in seeing where the industry is going. If an operator continues to outperform wells of other operators adjacent to the location, we see the under performing operators mimic that design.

This is the EOG Resources effect. It was doing huge, sand heavy frac jobs in areas operators said had too high of pressures. EOG proved the industry (or at least a large number of competitors wrong) wasn't looking at the situation correctly. The physics changed with the engineering, and we are still seeing its effect.

Newfield and EOG (EOG was still a great deal better) had outperformed in ND when the first horizontals targeting the middle Bakken were taking place. Newfield was working NE McKenzie, while EOG had a Parshall Field focus. Early results do not prove it will continue this into the future, but it has been consistent.

In ND, Newfield is the best operator based on oil production over the first 12 months of well life. This is based on locations completed in 2017. We pulled the data on 803 horizontals from 15 publicly traded companies. Continental is the most active followed by Exxon, and Whiting.