S&P Interviews Toby Rice: Thoughts on EQT, Chevron, Consolidation
Toby Rice, CEO of EQT (the largest natural gas producing company in the U.S.), recently granted an interview to a reporter from S&P Global Market Intelligence. The reporter asked some great questions, and Rice provided some interesting answers. Is Biden [if he actually wins] a net positive or negative for shale gas? Who’s EQT’s biggest competitor? What about more consolidation? And what are EQT’s plans for the Chevron assets?
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Yesterday Pittsburgh Business Times‘ ace reporter Paul Gough got EQT CEO Toby Rice to open up and talk about the company’s recently announced deal to buy Chevron’s considerable Marcellus/Utica assets (see 
EQT CEO Toby Rice has been positively chatty lately. He gave a great interview to the Pittsburgh Business Times revealing his thinking with respect to the recently announced Chevron deal (see today’s lead story). He also spoke to Bloomberg reporters. Rice shared his views on further consolidation in the M-U sector. He indicated EQT is still in the hunt for a deal with CNX and possibly other M-U drillers.
Last week Pennsylvania issued a paltry 3 new shale well drilling permits (lowest we’ve seen in months), Ohio issued a single new permit, and West Virginia issued 5 new shale well permits. All 3 PA permits were issued in Greene County. The OH permit was issued in Carroll County (bit of a surprise). And all 5 WV permits were issued in Tyler County.
An article in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal says there is a “split reality” emerging for U.S. shale drillers. Shale oil drillers are struggling to survive, while shale gas drillers, particularly in the Marcellus/Utica, are slowly seeing signs of financial recovery. The upshot is that you should consider investing in shale gas drillers (and not shale oil drillers).
Last week EQT Corporation announced a deal to buy Chevron’s considerable Marcellus/Utica assets (land and wells) for the lowball price of $735 million (see 
Looks like the rumors were true, at least one of them. Yesterday EQT announced it has cut a deal to buy Chevron’s considerable Appalachian assets for $735 million. The Reuters rumor from September said EQT had offered $750 million (see 
We don’t know how Pittsburgh Business Times ace reporter Paul Gough does it. Yesterday we told you Gough had gotten CNX CEO Nick DeIuliis to, in a roundabout way, discuss the rumor that EQT has floated a takeover offer to his company (see 
Bloomberg is reporting insider sources say EQT, already the biggest natural gas producer in the country (and pureplay driller in the Marcellus/Utica), has sent a takeover proposal to CNX Resources, another major Marcellus/Utica driller. Friendly? Hostile? Who knows. In September inside sources told Reuters that EQT had made a bid on Chevron’s extensive M-U acreage (see 
Although the big news from yesterday is that EQT is rumored to be eyeing a takeover of CNX Resources (see our lead story today), EQT released its third-quarter 2020 update yesterday with news almost as big. EQT previously announced it is looking to sell its right to ship gas along the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP). Yesterday the company said it believes a sale of its MVP capacity will happen by the end of this year.
We are on the cusp of the quarterly earnings reports issued by all publicly-traded companies. In fact, EQT, the largest natural gas-producing company in the U.S., released their numbers and held a conference call this morning (we’ll report on it tomorrow). As Marcellus/Utica drillers get ready to release their third-quarter numbers, analysts on Wall Street are signaling what they want to see.
We spotted a couple of stories, one in Barron’s the other in the Wall Street Journal, about the pickup in the futures price of natural gas over the past week, and how those recent gains have led to impressive gains in the share price for Marcellus/Utica drillers. Yesterday the NYMEX Henry Hub futures price closed up 4.11% to $2.74/Mcf. The rising tide lifts all boats.