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Comstock Resources, Inc. (CRK)

Q4 2012 Earnings Call· Tue, Feb 12, 2013

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Fourth Quarter 2012 Comstock Resources, Inc. Earnings Conference Call. My name is Erica, and I'll be your operator for today. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this conference is being recorded for replay purposes. I would now like to turn the call over to Jay Allison, President and CEO. Please proceed.

Miles Jay Allison

Analyst

Thank you, Erica. And, everyone, welcome to the Comstock Resources Fourth Quarter and Annual 2012 Financial and Operating Results Conference Call. You can view a slide presentation during or after this call by going to our website at www.comstockresources.com and clicking Presentations. There you'll find a presentation entitled Fourth Quarter 2012 Results. I'm Jay Allison, President of Comstock. And with me this morning are Roland Burns, our Chief Financial Officer; and Mark Williams, our Chief Operating Officer. During this call, we will discuss our 2012 operating and financial results. Please refer to Slide 2 in our presentation and note that our discussions today will be including forward-looking statements within the meaning of securities laws. While we believe the expectations of such statements to be reasonable, there can be no assurance that such expectations will prove to be correct. I know that there are probably 34 slides in the presentation. I'd like to give you kind of an overview right now from our perspective as far as the year and 2012 and 2013. And I know Roland and Mark will hit on some of the highlights and details in a moment, but just to kind of give you an overall view. Slide 3 summarizes the highlights of 2012. 2012, as well as 2013, are transition years for Comstock as we are changing the company from a 98% natural gas company to one with a more balance between oil and natural gas. We started 2012 with a partially proven Eagle Ford oil play and added the Permian properties in Reeves County as a new oil basin for us. In 2012, we saw natural gas prices decrease 36% from 2011, and our gas production dropped 9%. But then in 2012, we saw our oil production grow 175%, with the Eagle Ford becoming our…

Roland O. Burns

Analyst

Thanks, Jay. The first item I want to cover is the announcement we made yesterday to restate our financial results for the first 3 quarters of 2012. So if you refer to Slide 4. And while our oil hedging program has been a big economic success in 2012, we were required to change our accounting from hedge accounting to mark-to-market accounting. The net impact is that we have to include unrealized gain or loss related to the value of the oil hedge position in our income statement, instead of just an equity. As a result, we've recognized an unrealized loss of $10.2 million in the first quarter and unrealized gain of $34.8 million in the second quarter and an unrealized loss of $1.1 million in the third quarter. For the 9-month period, this accounting change has us reducing our loss after income taxes to $21.9 million as compared to the $29.4 million loss we previously reported. Even though the hedges were effective throughout all of 2012, our underlying documentation that designate the contracts as hedges were not completed in a timely manner. The technical requirements to use hedge accounting are unforgiving, and we failed to live up to them. We do want to apologize to our stockholders for any confusion this restatement has created. On Slide 5, we show our oil production on a daily basis by quarter. Our oil production in 2012 grew by 175%. In the fourth quarter, oil production fell to 6,100 barrels per day as compared to the third quarter, where we produced 7,200 barrels per day. The decrease is mostly due to the activity in our Eagle Ford Shale properties in South Texas, which is shown in light blue on this chart, which averaged 4,300 barrels per day as compared to the 5,000 barrels per…

Mark A. Williams

Analyst

Thank you, Roland, and Happy Fat Tuesday to everyone. On Slide 21, we recap our activity in our East Texas/North Louisiana region. In the first quarter, we drilled 3 operated Haynesville wells, 2.5 net, before moving our 2 operated drilling rigs out of this region. We participated in another 4 non-operated wells, 0.7 [ph] net. We completed all of our operated Haynesville wells this year, and we still have 2 or 0.1 net of the non-operated wells -- Haynesville wells waiting to be completed. We will be able to exploit our 6 Tcfe of Haynesville and Bossier resource potential in the future when improved gas prices provide economics competitive with our oil projects. Slide 22, we cover our South Texas operations, where all of our activity has been in our oil-focused Eagle Ford Shale play. We still have 35,000 gross acres and 28,000 net acres in the oil window of the Eagle Ford Shale. Based on 80-acre spacing, we believe we have 277 horizontal locations, including the wells we have already drilled. We have excluded some of our Northern acreage and any acreage that we think is undrillable from this estimate. We estimate that our properties have 78 million barrels of oil equivalent potential. This year, we drilled 30 wells, 20.5 net to our interest, and the wells we drilled had an average initial production rate of 675 barrels of oil equivalent per day. Slide 23 and 24 show the results and locations of the 47 wells, which are currently producing. We completed 6 more Eagle Ford Shale wells since our last update. They are wells 42 to 47 on the list. The 47 Eagle Ford shale wells that were completed had an average per well initial production rate of 702 BOE per day. These wells are being produced under…

Miles Jay Allison

Analyst

Thank you, Mark, and again, Roland, earlier. If you look at the very last slide, the 2013 outlook, I mean, we are excited about the prospects for Comstock this year because we are able now to inventory our Haynesville gas region, and we'll spend our money this year developing our 2 Tier 1 oil basins, the Eagle Ford and the Permian, as Mark just reviewed. We expect the strong growth in our oil production will be more than offset -- will more than offset the low natural gas prices to allow us to have higher revenues and cash flow and be a much more profitable company in 2013. And we expect oil to comprise more than 25% of our 2013 production. 94% of the net wells that we will drill in 2013 will be oil wells and 92% of our budget will be spent on oil projects. Even though overall production this year is expected to decline, we do expect oil to grow by 40% to 60% over last year, which will grow our revenues and grow our cash flow. Our Eagle Ford shale program will be, again, our largest growth engine for this year, and we also see tremendous upside in future horizontal development in the emerging Wolfcamp shale based on recent activities in Reeves County, and hopefully, our own Gaucho well. And we continue to have one of the lowest overall cost structures industry, and we have adequate liquidity for our 2013 drilling plans. We expect operating cash flow to fund most of our planned drilling program and that the availability under our bank credit facility will increase with our oil reserve growth. We'll continue utilizing an oil price hedging strategy to protect our oil-focused drilling program. And as I stated earlier, a key component to Comstock in 2013 is to de-lever our balance sheet by bringing in a partner in our Permian drilling program later this year. We think a good partner will create a win-win situation in the Permian and allow us to de-lever our balance sheet, and enable the Permian to be developed on a more consistent scale, incorporating both the vertical and the horizontal well programs that Mark just described. So for the rest of the call, we'll take questions only from research analysts who follow the stock. Erika, I'll turn it back to you.

Operator

Operator

[Operator Instructions] And our first question comes from the line of Leo Mariani with RBC.

Leo P. Mariani - RBC Capital Markets, LLC, Research Division

Analyst

Just a question around your comments about partnering in the Permian. Is that something you guys are pursuing extremely quickly here, you're getting after that right away? And should we expect that to be a very similar type of deal that we saw in the Eagle Ford in terms of structure?

Roland O. Burns

Analyst

Yes, this is Roland, Leo. Yes, on the question about looking for a partner in the Permian, it's something that we do want to -- we're going to start after we get the results from the 2 Wolfcamp A horizontal wells. So it's something that we like to kind of have identified a potential partner by the end of the second quarter. So that's kind of our goal, and it will be a similar process to the Eagle Ford. And as far as the actual structure, we're really hoping to how that will be structured. I think we would -- since we want to use it more to de-lever the balance sheet, it probably have to be structured differently. It would be more upfront funds. We have a lot invested in the Wolfbone properties. So I would see the structure in the Eagle Ford, which works right there, might not be ideal for this one if we're going to use it to de-lever the balance sheet.

Leo P. Mariani - RBC Capital Markets, LLC, Research Division

Analyst

Okay, that makes a lot of sense. And I guess, another question for you guys. In terms of the Gaucho well, sounds like you guys are going to know results in that pretty soon. Will we expect to -- you guys can expect to release those prior to first quarter earnings? Could we see an interim update with some results there?

Roland O. Burns

Analyst

Yes, this is Roland again, Leo. I think that we'll decide that kind of later on. I think, unfortunately, it would have been nice if the Gaucho could report results today because we, as a company like to give a comprehensive update to our drilling results every quarter versus picking wells to point out. But we understand the importance of the Gaucho and understand the importance of putting out something from the company versus having it leak out in the market. So I think that's something we'll evaluate once we actually even know what the well is going to do. And so the typical timeframe for the other 2 horizontals, it has taken about 2 to 3 weeks to establish an initial rate. So we're -- hopefully, today will just start the very first day of recovering some of the frac fluids that were injected in the well.

Miles Jay Allison

Analyst

Yes, Leo, my comments to follow up with Roland, I mean I think we have too much debt. We do have to de-lever our balance sheet. We intentionally levered up the company in order to add the 2 oil basins, and we did bring in a perfect JV partner in the Eagle Ford. And of course, in the Eagle Ford, we didn't pay $332 million to enter the Eagle Ford. We base leased our acreage and then drilled it. I think we acted differently in the Permian. And now the Permian, we've had really good results vertically. I expect to have really good results horizontally with the Gaucho and the Balmorhea, which is at Wolfcamp A, which is our first horizontal Wolfcamp A. So I think with that, we will open the debt room, as Roland said, and -- but this JV will be structured differently than the Eagle Ford because we need to de-lever our balance sheet. And then I think as far as the press release on the Gaucho, I mean, we're listening to all of the stockholders and we'll act accordingly. So I hope that helps.

Leo P. Mariani - RBC Capital Markets, LLC, Research Division

Analyst

Could you address well costs on these horizontals you're doing in the Wolfcamp and also what you're seeing in the vertical Wolfbone well costs?

Miles Jay Allison

Analyst

Yes, Mark will do that.

Mark A. Williams

Analyst

Yes [indiscernible] well cost on the horizontal Wolfcamp were -- our hefty cost is about $10 million right now. We still have some science involved and we drilled a 50% longer lateral or almost 50% longer on this one and a significantly larger frac job. So while our service costs have down, we've kind of evened that up with the additional lateral length and the additional frac-ing on this well. As far as vertical Wolfbone, our cost is coming down. I don't have real hard numbers, but I think our goal is to be around $4 million, and we are working toward that goal. I wouldn't say we're there yet, but we're getting much closer. And then in the Eagle Ford, you saw the curve. We're down around $8 million or a little bit less. We used $8.2 million in our budget because we have a lot of longer laterals and longer than the 5,800 feet. So we standardized that cost to be able to compare apples-to-apples across the field. But if you drill 7,000-foot laterals, the well is going to cost a little bit more. So that's kind of where we're at on that, and we've seen the significant stimulation cost reductions in the Eagle Ford, which has helped us come down on those costs.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Amir Arif of Stifel, Nicolaus. Amir Arif - Stifel, Nicolaus & Co., Inc., Research Division: Just a question about the Permian. The key question really is, can you just talk about the partnership that you're thinking about the Permian and how that ties into your oil production growth guidance that you've laid out? If you bring in a partner, would you accelerate activity to keep your net oil volume growth at 40 to 60? Or is this going to be more just straight balance sheet reduction?

Roland O. Burns

Analyst

Well, Amir, the -- our production growth goals this year are based on not bringing in a partner, so that's the program that's kind of budgeted for. I think as a goal of this company to de-lever, I think that bringing in a partner into the Permian would -- the big benefits would be we would have more activity there and hopefully spend less dollars there and have more activity. So I mean we can't really say what the -- since we don't know what the structure will look like, we don't know the impact, but the overall goal would be that we can actually have more production growth this year potentially if we have more capital available to add another rig to the Eagle Ford. That's one of the goals of doing a joint venture in the Permian, would be to accelerate activity in the Eagle Ford where we can immediately bring on more oil production if we could add another rig there, at the same time, de-lever the balance sheet. So right now though, the guidance that we're providing assumes that we're not -- we're going to stick with the plan as it is, which is to spend the money that we have budgeted. Amir Arif - Stifel, Nicolaus & Co., Inc., Research Division: Okay. So just to summarize, is there a downside risk to that number with a partnership or upside risk to the net volumes for the oil side? I guess, it depends on the structure.

Roland O. Burns

Analyst

Depends on the structure and depends on whether they participate in the current producing wells. The Eagle Ford that was structured where they did not. So there's a lot of ifs. But if there would be any type of downside, it would be very temporary because I think in the long run, it would allow us to accelerate activity as a company. And the quicker that we add a rig in the Eagle Ford, we can make up a whole lot of oil production that may go to a partner in the Permian. Amir Arif - Stifel, Nicolaus & Co., Inc., Research Division: Okay. And then just a follow-up question on your Gaines County acreage, if you can just give us an update on what your plans are for that.

Roland O. Burns

Analyst

Right now, our activity, Amir, is focused in the Reeves County acreage, so we are kind evaluating our Gaines County acreage to determine how best to go and proceed with testing that, and we really don't have a plan that we want to talk about yet. So we do know that we need to get it evaluated, and that's kind of in the works.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Mike Kelly with Global Hunter Securities.

Michael Kelly - Global Hunter Securities, LLC, Research Division

Analyst · Global Hunter Securities.

I was just hoping you could clarify what you think the biggest driver is and the difference in the performance you've seen in your horizontal Wolfcamp wells versus what you've seen in the offset Concho wells. Is it just as simple as they're targeting the Wolfcamp A with their laterals or is there some other notable difference in how they're completing producing these wells?

Mark A. Williams

Analyst · Global Hunter Securities.

Mike, this is Mark. The completions are similar, not significantly different by any means, and the lateral lengths are similar. So I do believe it's just the rock is acting different in the middle Wolfcamp, in the Wolfcamp B, versus that Wolfcamp A section. So that's kind of the simple answer, and we'll be able to verify that with the Gaucho well and then following up with that with our Balmorhea well, which will be in the Wolfcamp A as well. So that's what we believe right now, that it's just the rock quality in the areas where we drilled our wells. We do believe that, that middle Wolfcamp has some significant potential over to the East. It does look better over to the East. And at some point in the future, we want to test that. But we're going to focus this year on the Wolfcamp A because that's where we've seen the most success.

Michael Kelly - Global Hunter Securities, LLC, Research Division

Analyst · Global Hunter Securities.

Got it. And Roland, a question for you. I was just hoping that -- you gave oil guidance, reiterated it at 40% to 60% growth in 2013, but was hoping for some help on Q1. How does that progression look on the oil side in the Eagle Ford and in the Permian?

Roland O. Burns

Analyst · Global Hunter Securities.

Yes, Mike, in the Eagle Ford, yes, we still have some of the issues that kind of flagged the fourth quarter, especially in the month of January and part of February. But we do expect to see our total company production oil grow from the fourth quarter levels, but probably not quite back to where we were in the third quarter of last year. I think that March will be real strong, but it's going to be diluted a little bit by January and part of February because we still had shut-ins and not many new wells coming on yet, so -- well, Mike, I think our biggest production from quarter to quarter just based on how the Eagle Ford, which is the biggest driver, is stacked up, the second quarter growth over the first quarter will be our most dramatic growth quarter-to-quarter just based on today's schedule. Because there, you'll have the benefit of coming and starting the quarter with really hot production month and having some good completions. And then we see kind of fairly consistent growth from the second to the third to the third to the fourth despite the spottiness in the completions, the way that it kind of matches in the different quarters. So really, a big uplift by the second quarter and then some moderate growth in the third and fourth. The wildcard in the production forecast is how does the horizontal Wolfcamps, how do they come in, because we're up -- we're being conservative in what we expect from them. And so they have the ability to allow us to have higher expectations for oil, but we need to see the results of those 2 wells.

Miles Jay Allison

Analyst · Global Hunter Securities.

I think to be accountable, I mean, to the stockholder, we -- 2 things. One, we put Slide 26 in, which shows you the completions per month for the Eagle Ford. We thought that visual was very important. And then I have asked Mark to kind of give an update on fourth quarter production versus where we are today. And really, the location of the Eagle Ford wells that we drilled and the completion times, I think that's big because, again, the Permian will be pretty consistent, I think, from here on out. But really, the driver of the predictable well is the Eagle Ford. I mean we hit a huge well in the Gaucho and the Balmorhea, then all bets are off to the upside because it will be really good in the Permian. But we're still kind of going through that dance. We've got some really good vertical wells that are very predictable in the Permian. But right now, in our model, the real driver of our oil is the Eagle Ford. So I'll let Mark kind of give you his COO view of that.

Mark A. Williams

Analyst · Global Hunter Securities.

All right. This is Mark. I'll run through both areas real quick and just kind of give you a list of things. In the Eagle Ford, several factors affected our Q4 and early Q1 production, and we've already spoken about most these, but I'll hit them again. As shown on Slide 26, a very small number of wells came online since last October, and this continues really through this month. And then in late February and March, we just have a big ramp-up of completion activity. This is mainly due to the pad drilling that we're executing, which defers our completions until after all the pads are drilled and then you move in those frac crews and you frac the whole -- all the wells on the pads. So everything just takes longer, it defers that activity. The second factor is that 2 of our last 4 wells that we've completed are in Atascosa County. That was the Mesquite well and the DVR well. And that's where IP rates are significantly lower than in our prime McMullen County acreage. These are lease obligation wells. They hold a significant amount of acreage, so we felt they were valuable to drill even though they're not our Tier 1 acreage. Third, we had several wells shut in for extended periods and mainly in December for offset frac-ing either by us or by other operators across the leased line from us. And lastly, we had numerous operational issues beginning in early to mid-December and continuing until just about now. And these were mainly due with new wells loading up and artificial lift-related issues that we've had to work through. We still had 5 wells down this morning, and all of which -- all but one of which should be returned to production in the…

Miles Jay Allison

Analyst · Global Hunter Securities.

If you look in our budgets in the Eagle Ford, it's 27 net wells. 22 of the 27 are in McMullen, kind of like Mark said. And then you go to the Permian, I mean, we had 27 net wells in the Permian also. 20 of those were vertical wells, and they're going to be really configured toward the Tier 1 portion that we de-risked, and then the 7 -- there are 7 net horizontal wells. And instead of drilling a Monroe well or a Dale Evans type well, the 7 wells that we will drill in 2013 will be, one is the Gaucho, and so Wolfcamp A; the second one is a Balmorhea, that's a Wolfcamp A. We don't plan on drilling any of the horizontal wells in the Permian till we know the outcome of the Gaucho and then the Balmorhea. And then our goal is to kind of offset those wells and we'll kind of inch out from those core wells in our development program for horizontal wells in 2013. So it's going to be a lot more predictable, and I think that's what we need to do for this year. I hope that's a long, long answer, but I think everybody deserves that answer.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Cameron Horwitz with U.S. Capital Advisors.

Cameron Horwitz - U.S. Capital Advisors LLC, Research Division

Analyst · U.S. Capital Advisors.

Quick question for Mark here. Mark, can you talk just a little bit about the well design on the Gaucho State well? At 60- or 100-foot lateral, 18 stages, so about 375 feet per stage. Seems a little bit wide. Can you just talk about why didn't you do a little bit more frac intensity in terms of the number of stages on that well?

Mark A. Williams

Analyst · U.S. Capital Advisors.

Cameron, this is Mark. That's very similar to both our Haynesville and our Eagle Ford designs. In fact, in the Eagle Ford, we typically catch about 400 feet or a little bit over 400 feet per stage. We use 9 clusters per stage, and we limit the number of perforations so that we get about 2 barrels a minute per perforation. Here, we use 7 perforation clusters per stage instead of 9. And so we're a little bit more conservative here than we are in the Eagle Ford, where we've proven to our ourselves that, that design works. And so I would say we're a little more conservative here. Obviously, the less clusters you catch and the tighter the spacing, the more expensive the completion. So we feel like we've balanced out here in this completion pretty well. And if can we prove through some logging and analysis that we can add a cluster or 2 at each stage in the future, we'll probably do that. But for now, we're probably going to stick with this design.

Operator

Operator

The next question comes from the line of Michael Hall with Robert W. Baird. Michael A. Hall - Robert W. Baird & Co. Incorporated, Research Division: I guess, I wanted to dig in a little bit on the cost structure side of the equation. Cost structure on the lifting side propped up in the fourth quarter, just curious on the outlook for that as you work through '13, as you bring company volumes back on, should we expect that to come back down or just probably how should we think about that?

Roland O. Burns

Analyst

Sure, Micheal, this is Roland. If you look at the, today, the lifting cost just by the regions, I think you will see some improvement in the South Texas region, just a modest improvement with the higher volumes because there's still a fixed cost structure there. But again, we will be adding some dollars to the overall lifting cost as we put more wells in our official lift and the other type costs that goes along with that. So that the lifting cost rate in the fourth quarter was like $1.93 per Mcfe even though it still had an Mcfe basis. And we see that declining slightly as we look ahead to 2013 with the better volumes. I think there'll be a more dramatic improvement in the West Texas area, the same way where we had a repair cost also in the quarter and had a $4.11 per Mcfe-type lifting total all-in rate, including gathering and production taxes. We see a big improvement to that rate with the volumes coming up in that area. But then as a company-wide, obviously, in the gas -- where the gas production is, other than the production taxes and gathering costs, which are fairly proportional to the production levels, we'll see higher rates, lifting rates in the Haynesville/Bossier just because of the volume declines, and the rest of the costs there are fairly fixed. And so company-wide, I don't -- I think that we will have those 2 factors kind of working together. And then so as far as the overall lifting rate, which was $1.19 in the fourth quarter, I think the numbers, we'll see a little higher lifting rates consolidated for all of the regions as we go into 2013. We see it at a level starting kind of where it was the fourth quarter to all-in kind of lifting rates approaching $1.40 or something by the end of the year, just as the mix of oil is higher versus the gas and just the lower gas volumes and the fixed cost. So kind of a complicated answer, but that's kind of what we'll see overall. Michael A. Hall - Robert W. Baird & Co. Incorporated, Research Division: That's helpful. And then, I guess, also on a kind of corporate level, I think you, in the past, alluded to reaching closer towards a kind of cash flow neutrality in back half of '13, I guess. Where is your head on that? And excluding any impacts of a potential JV, we'll see that occurring in '13 or is that being pushed back at this point?

Roland O. Burns

Analyst

No, Michael, we see us getting very close to that in the second half of '13 with the oil mix. Of course, a lot of it depends on overall -- especially the gas, what's the gas commodity price is and are we closer to the $4, are we closer to the $3. It's a big variable there. But -- and I think we've also been fairly conservative in the estimate of cost as you can see from our budget. So I think we're still under this year's plan without the JV, bring those 2 rigs close to each other in the second half of 2013 with a modest overspend in the first half given where current natural gas prices are at in the market. Michael A. Hall - Robert W. Baird & Co. Incorporated, Research Division: Okay. And so those are -- those comments are based on basically strip pricing today? Is that...

Roland O. Burns

Analyst

Right, those are based on the strip pricing today. So we always -- in all our planning, we use strip pricing. So every time we want to look at it, we just run them again versus taking a view on -- a different view on the market. So I think what the idea of really achieving debt reduction and really de-levering the balance sheet is what we want to accomplish by bringing a partner into the Permian. And so that's a big focus of this year's goal, as well as developing the 2 big oil plays.

Miles Jay Allison

Analyst

Well, and like Roland said, if you talk at maybe the game changer in the Permian for the horizontal, the Wolfcamp A, I mean in the model, we get horizontal wells just a slight increase from the vertical wells that we know what their average IP rate is. So we bump that up a little bit, but we don't give it a high number. So if these wells come in at a high number, then that's a game changer, too, as you know.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Mario Barraza with Tuohy Brothers.

Mario Barraza - Tuohy Brothers Investment Research, Inc.

Analyst · Tuohy Brothers.

Jay, I just want to follow up on your comments about, in the Delaware Basin. You mentioned you're going to be targeting the Tier 1 acreage. How would you rank, now that you've delineated on a vertical basis, the acreage on a tier side, Tier 1? Is there a few tiers, say, Tier 1, Tier 2, Tier 3? And how does that break out percentage-wise?

Miles Jay Allison

Analyst · Tuohy Brothers.

Well, I think when I say Tier 1, when we look at our drilling program in 2013, we're going to focus if we can, again, some of this is lease obligation-driven, we're going to focus our vertical wells near offset wells maybe on different leases. We've had 300-, 400-, 500-barrel a day IP rate wells. We're going to try to do that and then we'll try to stay away from the areas where vertically, we put our 180-, 190-, 200-type barrel a day wells. And you can see that on one of the charts that we've handed out. I mean that's our goal, if we can do that. I mean, there might be some straggler wells that we need to drill in order to hold the lease blocks, but that's not something we're going to try to focus on. Mark might want to comment some more on that, but that's how I look at.

Mark A. Williams

Analyst · Tuohy Brothers.

That's exactly what we're going to try to do. We still haven't determined that some of the fringe acreage isn't valuable for horizontal drilling. So until we determine that, one way or the other, where we can, we're going to hold the large acreage blocks. But we're going to do that with a minimum number of wells and minimum cost, and really try to focus to build our production more than anything.

Mario Barraza - Tuohy Brothers Investment Research, Inc.

Analyst · Tuohy Brothers.

Okay. And then just a clarification point, Jay, earlier in the call, you said that your footprint now is 42,000 net acres. Is that correct or is it the 44,000 still?

Miles Jay Allison

Analyst · Tuohy Brothers.

We started out a year and 2 months ago at 44,000. Then we traded some acreage. We bought a little acreage. We sold a little acreage. And so the net, I think the net is like 41,500 acres to 42,000 net acres. That's the number.

Operator

Operator

Your next question comes from the line of Richard Tullis with Capital One Southcoast.

Richard M. Tullis - Capital One Southcoast, Inc., Research Division

Analyst · Capital One Southcoast.

I think most of my questions have been touched on. I just wanted to check on the time when those horizontal Haynesville wells will be coming online.

Miles Jay Allison

Analyst · Capital One Southcoast.

Well, the Gaucho well, the [indiscernible] should be...

Roland O. Burns

Analyst · Capital One Southcoast.

No, the Horizontal Haynesville well, did you say?

Richard M. Tullis - Capital One Southcoast, Inc., Research Division

Analyst · Capital One Southcoast.

Yes, that's correct.

Mark A. Williams

Analyst · Capital One Southcoast.

I believe we have those scheduled -- we have a rig scheduled to come in, in, I'm thinking it's the first or second week of March. And they're 2 wells on the same pads. We're just going to go ahead and drill them both at the same time, so they're probably May or June, probably May or June as far as IP rates on those 2. And those are lease obligation wells under a lease we took and we [indiscernible] up a while back. And we were obligated to drill 4 wells, and we drilled 2 of them last year and these will be the other 2 remaining wells. And then as far as all the other wells in the well count, those are just non-placeholders assuming that some of the partners would propose wells. We just don't -- we haven't -- don't have any proposed at this time. We don't know if anybody's going to propose any to us or not.

Richard M. Tullis - Capital One Southcoast, Inc., Research Division

Analyst · Capital One Southcoast.

Okay. And then, I guess, a quick question on CapEx. You see kind of level spending throughout the year. I heard you talking about being close to cash flow neutral in the second half. Does that assume kind of level CapEx numbers throughout the year?

Roland O. Burns

Analyst · Capital One Southcoast.

That's correct, Richard. We think the -- that given -- yes, the rig count will stay very consistent through the year. So other than the Haynesville, where we might -- that activity will bring the rig count of a one-off activity. So in the end, we'll make a run at trying to extend that or push that out. But it may not be successful, so it's budgeted. So that's the only activity that would be kind of, in one particular quarter, which sounds like it could be more in the second quarter. But the rest of it will be fairly leveled out. Some of the completions may stack up heavier in one quarter than another.

Operator

Operator

That's all the time we have for today's Q&A session. I would now turn the call back over to Jay Allison for any closing remarks.

Miles Jay Allison

Analyst

Yes, thank you, Erica. And again, our goal this conference call is to get, quite frankly, 2012 behind us and it's to continue to transition this company, I mean, away from this 98% natural gas platform we had, which at that time, several years ago, that was a good platform, today, it's a horrible platform. And in order to change the platform, we did have to add 2 Tier 1 oil basins. I think we're exactly where we need to be. I think our performance is a little lumpy. We're very disappointed in the fourth quarter results. I think that's part of just transitioning to become an oil company. And that's a little bit of the lumpiness in the Eagle Ford, which, again, is the driver. We did have a disappointing Dale Evans well and that did hurt production, and we're not going to do that again in 2013. We're going to kind of hunker down, drill these Wolfcamp A wells, which is out of the Gaucho, the Balmorhea or some others maybe. And it will -- the Permian is a very hot area right now. We've had phone calls asking what they could do with us in the Permian for prospective partners. So that's a good thing. It's a good thing to be in a nice hot area where I think 20% of all the oil produced in the United States comes from the Permian, and that's for a reason, and we're right in the middle of it. So we're very, very pleased. And we were at a conference last week and we were in New York a couple of weeks ago, and our goal was, and we didn't know this, and Mark moved up this completion date on the Gaucho because really, the Gaucho initially wasn't scheduled to be completed until today. But we did move that up and we did have the 18-stage frac, and like he said, we should start flowing that well back today. And that's a great thing, so we at least don't have that hanging out there. And we just need to see the rock quality of the Wolfcamp A that we drilled in. And again, as Mark said, it's between 2 good offset wells that some other companies own. So we'll see what happens, and I hope that we've given full accountability of 2012, and particularly, where we're going in 2013. It's a privilege to work here, and we try to do the right thing and we try to be accountable. So anyhow, thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you for your participation on today's conference. This concludes the presentation. Everyone may now disconnect, and have a great day.