GMX Resources Inc. says it has sold “substantially all” of its assets to an undisclosed party in a bankruptcy auction worth $338 million.
The bankruptcy court is scheduled to consider approval of the sale during a Sept. 10 hearing.
The auction, held Aug. 28, was almost five months after the Oklahoma City-based oil and gas company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
In its April 1 bankruptcy filing GMX listed assets of $281.1 million and debt of $458.5 million as of Dec. 1.
The $338 million figure was the baseline offer for the assets at auction, which company officials hoped would garner competing, and potentially higher and better offers.
In June, GMX reported losses for eight consecutive quarters.
According to court documents, the company’s cash resources had declined significantly, dropping from $107 million in the fourth quarter of 2011 down to $18 million in the third quarter of 2012.
Low oil prices cited
GMX cited low gas prices as a primary cause of its financial problems.
In 2010, the company made a strategic decision to expand from East Texas into basins with oil potential. In the first half of 2011, the company acquired positions in more than 75,000 undeveloped net acres in the Williston Basin of North Dakota and Montana, targeting the Bakken and Three Forks formations, and in the Denver Julesburg Basin of Wyoming, targeting the emerging Niobrara play.
Though managing to boost its production to about 5,400 barrels of oil equivalent per day, this accounted for only about 11 percent of the company’s total net output as of last year’s third quarter, the last time GMX submitted a required quarterly financial statement to the SEC.
—Kay Cashman
