Pioneer Natural Resources Co. (NYSE: PXD) said Oct. 31 it will exit another asset as the Irving, Texas-based company continued toward its goal of becoming a Permian Basin pure-play.

Early this year, Pioneer embarked on a divestiture process for all of its assets outside the Permian, which in some cases had been part of the company’s portfolio for decades. These assets included positions in the Eagle Ford, South Texas, West Panhandle and Rockies regions.

Pioneer’s most recent exit is the sale on Oct. 31 of its position in the Sinor Nest (Lower Wilcox) Field in Live Oak County in South Texas. The company said an undisclosed third party agreed to buy all of its interests in the field for $132 million.

The sale represents all of Pioneer’s interests in the Sinor Nest Field, including all of its producing wells and the associated infrastructure.

Pioneer’s position in Sinor Nest (Lower Wilcox) Field is comprised of roughly 2,900 net acres. Net production from the acreage averaged about 3,100 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boe/d) during the second quarter.

During the company’s second-quarter earnings call in August, Pioneer CEO Timothy L. Dove said the divestitures were a work in progress, but it’s going well.

“At the end of the process, and I think it will take essentially the balance of all of this year, it will result in Pioneer becoming that pure-play Permian Basin player that we've been talking about. Importantly, it will improve our reported margins, our per-barrel and per-boe metrics and corporate returns when that's all completed,” Dove said on the call, according to a transcript by SeekingAlpha.

So far this year, Pioneer has sold Texas Panhandle and Raton Basin assets as well as a portion of its Eagle Ford Shale assets.

Most recently, Pioneer said in July it agreed to sell its legacy West Panhandle position to an undisclosed buyer for $201 million, which the company expected to close in third-quarter 2018.

Other divestitures included its Raton Basin assets in southeastern Colorado to Evergreen Natural Resources LLC for $79 million, which closed in July. The company also sold its Eagle Ford joint venture (JV) assets to Sundance Energy Australia Ltd. (NASDAQ: SNDE). The $221.5 million transaction, which closed in April, included assets held by Pioneer’s JV partner Reliance Industries Ltd.

Pro forma the Sinor Nest Field sale, proceeds from the company’s divestitures have totaled $633.5 million.

In August, Pioneer also bumped up its capex for 2018 to the range of $3.3 billion to $3.4 billion from the previous $2.9 billion target, all of which will be deployed to its Permian Basin position.

Dove said the boost in capital spending will be funded by an increased amount of operating cash flow as well as the proceeds from the asset divestitures.

Pioneer expects to close the Sinor Nest Field sale fourth-quarter 2018, subject to the satisfaction of customary closing conditions.

Emily Patsy can be reached at epatsy@hartenergy.com.

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