Story by Jerry Bohnen |OK Energy Today|Ten years after SandRidge Energy had nearly 1,900 employees, the Oklahoma City energy company is down to nearly 100 employees.
A new yearly filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission by SandRidge showed the firm had 102 full-time employees including 87 in the field and 15 in corporate offices as of December 31, 2023. Four years after selling its SandRidge Tower at 123 Robert S. Kerr Avenue in a $35.4 million deal with the state of Oklahoma, SandRidge has officed in Bricktown at 1 E. Sheridan Avenue, Suite 500.
In 2014, the company had 1,878 full-time employees and 661 of them were at the headquarters in the SandRidge Tower. Since then, the company went on a downward spiral and came out of bankruptcy in 2016.
The filing also revealed that as of the end of 2023, SandRidge does very little drilling if any at all. The firm stated it “had no active drilling rigs” as of December 31, 2023. During 2023, the company indicated, there were two operated wells drilled and four wells completed. Zero wells awaited completion at the end of the year.
But it still had an interest in 1,453 gross producing wells of which the firm operated 958 and most were in Oklahoma and Kansas. It still had 548,895 gross total acres under lease. Its total estimated proved reserves were 55.7 MMBoe at the end of last year.
SandRidge managed to expand its holding of producing wells in a $10.6 million acquisition of 26 producing wells within the Northwest STACK play in July of last year.
The firm indicated because its production and reserves are in the Mid-Continent region, it could expose the firm to “operational and regulatory risk” in the area. SandRidge leaders also expressed concern about one issue that grabbed headlines in Oklahoma last week—ESG discrimination by financial firms.
“Recently, activists concerned about the potential effects of climate change have directed their attention at sources of funding for fossil-fuel energy companies, which has resulted in certain financial institutions, funds and other sources of capital restricting or eliminating their investment in oil and natural gas activities. Ultimately, this could make it more difficult to secure
funding for exploration and production activities or increase the costs of such funding,” stated SandRidge in its SEC filing.
SandRidge included various cautions about how its existence could be affected by market conditions, a lack of transportation arrangements and the availability of a ready market for the firm’s oil, natural gas and NGL production. It even suggested that if certain negative impacts were to occur, the firm might have to shut in wells.
SandRidge reported cash flow from operations of $115.6 million at the end of 2023 and $164.7 million at the end of 2022.
“We are not actively trying to raise debt or equity capital at this time, with current projected activity for the year financed by cash flow from operations or cash held on the balance sheet.”
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