Chesapeake 1Q: $764M Net Loss, $532M FCF, 13 Rigs Drilled 41 Wells
Yesterday Chesapeake Energy Corporation issued its first quarter 2022 update. At a high level, the company generated just over $3 billion in revenue during 1Q with $1.7 billion in operating expenses. However, the company lost $2.1 billion on derivatives and hedges (bad bets on the price of oil and gas), leading to a net loss of $764 million for the quarter. Chesapeake managed to generate $532 million in free cash flow during the quarter. Of the company’s three main operational areas–the Marcellus, the Haynesville, and the Eagle Ford–the Marcellus still gets the most love with the most wells drilled and most money spent. But not by much. The company’s new Haynesville assets are seeing a huge investment and will likely overtake the Marcellus at some point.
Read More “Chesapeake 1Q: $764M Net Loss, $532M FCF, 13 Rigs Drilled 41 Wells”
Wow! This is getting interesting…and scary. The NYMEX futures price of natural gas for the current “front month” contract soared another 37 cents yesterday to close at $8.78 per MMBtu. Another 14-year high. It certainly looks as though the price will soon blow by $9/MMBtu. One expert says “we feel we easily can go over $10 in prompt-month [pricing] over the next several weeks.” Yikes! What’s causing this massive spike?
In March the Pennsylvania Environmental Quality Board (EQB), a sub-agency of the Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP), approved a final version of onerous new regulations that supposedly will capture every last molecule of stray methane that leaks from shale and conventional drilling operations (see 
The Pennsylvania Dept. of Conservation and Natural Resources (DCNR) has, for years, claimed that under a centuries-old law the state of PA “owns” the property under “navigable” waterways–including rivers and streams (see 
Somehow the memo hasn’t yet reached the White House that the radical left base of Joe Biden’s supporters, the small minority of wackos who actually run the show, have turned their back on and now oppose carbon capture and storage (CCS) because it is a “distraction” from achieving renewable nirvana (see 
MARCELLUS/UTICA REGION: NY gas drillers slam pipeline operator’s obstruction; NATIONAL: U.S. shale cash flow about to wipe out a decade worth of losses; US weekly LNG exports up by two LNG carriers; INTERNATIONAL: Equinor dishes out over $2 billion in oil drilling contracts; Germany ramps up capacity for LNG imports to replace Russian gas; Europe’s quest to replace Russian gas faces plenty of hurdles.