OKLAHOMA CITY, Nov. 3 (UPI) -- U.S. shale player Continental Resources said momentum moving forward was strong enough to raise its expectations for output for North Dakota and Oklahoma.
Continental, which has its headquarters in Oklahoma, said it expects to end the year with production volumes that are about 5 percent more than it estimated in August. The company said it was betting on recovery from enhanced work at the Bakken shale oil reserve basin in North Dakota, and the SCOOP and STACK reservoirs in Oklahoma.
"We have expanded the productive footprint of STACK, SCOOP and the Bakken core, and are increasing the value of these assets," Chairman and CEO Harold Hamm said in a statement.
State mineral resource officials in North Dakota said there's been a steady increase in exploration and production activity there since June, but operators still showed reluctance to move very aggressively so long as oil prices stayed below the $60 per barrel mark. Oil prices on Thursday were in the mid $40 range.
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In Oklahoma, the state governor declared a day of prayer last month for the oil sector as the downturn for oil and gas sectors spilled over into other labor pools like manufacturing. Gross production taxes from the oil and gas sector are on pace for two straight years of contraction.
For the third quarter, Continental said its net production was about 5 percent lower than the second quarter and 9 percent lower year-on-year. Most of the decline came from North Dakota, though the company said it had curtailed production there in response to lower oil prices and was now picking up the pace.
Continental reported a net loss of $109.6 million, a loss that's 33 percent greater than the loss from third quarter 2015. In August, the company sold off some of its assets in and around the Bakken area for about $600 million in a move Hamm said helped reduce debt and strengthen the balance sheet.
