ATWOOD OCEANICS INC

ATWOOD OCEANICS INC terminated the registration of a class of securities, ending its reporting obligation for them.

listing compliance notice

ATWOOD OCEANICS INC's exchange filed to remove a class of its securities from listing.

listing compliance notice

The merger closed October 6, 2017: Ensco's merger subsidiary merged into Atwood, which became a wholly-owned Ensco subsidiary, and Atwood immediately paid off and terminated its credit facility in full -- the end of Atwood Oceanics as an independent company, twelve years after this filing history begins.

business combination

With the Ensco merger pending, Atwood said this would be its last quarterly Fleet Status Report -- an acknowledgment that its days as an independent, separately-reporting company were numbered.

production update

Atwood agreed to be acquired by Ensco plc in an all-stock merger, with Ensco absorbing Atwood as a wholly-owned subsidiary -- consolidation between two offshore drillers as the industry tried to cut excess capacity after three years of downturn.

business combination

Under the merger terms, each Atwood share converts to 1.60 Ensco Class A ordinary shares; both companies announced the deal in a joint press release the same day the agreement was signed.

business combination

Atwood and DSME agreed for a fifth time to delay delivery of the Atwood Admiral drillship, this time to September 2019, with Atwood paying $10 million now and pushing the remaining roughly $84 million payment out to 2022 -- deferring a rig it has no work for rather than cancelling it outright, a sign of how oversupplied the drillship market had become.

material agreement

As the oil-price downturn deepened, lenders overhauled Atwood's credit agreement: leverage covenants were scrapped entirely, a new $150 million minimum-liquidity requirement was added, total commitments were cut by $152 million, and -- most tellingly -- the company was barred from paying dividends, ending the payout it had started just eighteen months earlier.

debt financing

With oil prices deep into their collapse, lenders loosened Atwood's credit-agreement leverage covenant to 4.50x through 2017 (from 4.00x) -- the first sign of covenant relief after years of expanding the facility, an early symptom of the balance-sheet strain building from the downturn.

debt financing

Atwood declared its first-ever quarterly dividend, $0.25/share, payable January 2015 -- a new capital-return commitment made just as oil prices were beginning the slide that would define the next two years.

dividend declaration

Atwood's lenders extended its credit facility to May 2018 and raised total commitments to a peak $1.55 billion while cutting interest costs -- the high point of the company's borrowing capacity, just months before oil prices began their 2014 collapse.

debt financing

Atwood agreed to sell its older jackup, the Vicksburg, to Qatar's Gulf Drilling International for $55.4 million, closing expected in early 2014 -- shedding one of its smaller, lower-spec units as the fleet skews toward new high-spec drillships and jackups.

material agreement

Atwood amended its credit agreement to remove scheduled reductions and add incremental commitments, lifting the facility's maximum potential size to $1.3 billion -- borrowing capacity now sized to match its roughly $2.4 billion of newbuild commitments across four drillships and several jackups.

debt financing

A fourth drillship, the $635 million Atwood Archer, was ordered from DSME for December 2015 delivery -- the fleet's 17th unit and the fourth identical ultra-deepwater drillship ordered in under two and a half years.

material agreement

Atwood raised another $200 million by tapping its existing 6.50% senior notes due 2020, bringing that bond issue to $650 million total -- more funding for the newbuild program.

material agreement

Atwood agreed to buy back 2 million shares from longtime major shareholder Helmerich & Payne for $107.1 million; H&P separately sold another 2 million shares to a financial institution, cutting its stake to about 6.3% of the company.

material agreement

ATWOOD OCEANICS INC's exchange filed to remove a class of its securities from listing.

listing compliance notice

The company's decade-old shareholder rights plan ("poison pill"), adopted in 2002, expired on its own terms and was not renewed, removing that takeover-defense mechanism.

security holder rights change

Even before delivery, the still-under-construction Atwood Advantage landed a three-year, $584,000/day contract with Noble Energy in the Eastern Mediterranean, adding $639 million to backlog and pushing the company's total backlog to about $2.9 billion -- among the largest deals in its history.

contract award

Atwood ordered a third drillship, the $635 million Atwood Admiral, for delivery by March 2015 -- the fleet's 16th rig -- funding it partly by raising its credit facility's accordion by $200 million to $550 million.

material agreement

Atwood tapped the public bond market for the first time, issuing $450 million of 6.50% senior notes due 2020 -- a new funding source alongside its bank credit lines to keep financing the newbuild program.

material agreement

Atwood ordered a second ultra-deepwater drillship, the $600 million Atwood Achiever, for June 2014 delivery -- exercising the option flagged in January and continuing its rapid entry into the drillship market.

debt financing

Atwood replaced its credit lines with a much larger $750 million, five-year revolving facility led by Nordea, secured against six rigs including the newly-delivered OSPREY -- a big step-up in borrowing capacity to match its expanding fleet and newbuild program.

debt financing

Atwood entered the ultra-deepwater drillship business for the first time, ordering the $600 million Atwood Advantage from DSME in South Korea for delivery in September 2013, with options for one or two more -- the fleet's 15th rig and a new class of asset for the company.

debt financing

Atwood exercised its option for a third PPL jackup, $190 million, delivery mid-2013 -- the fleet's 14th rig.

debt financing

The FALCON's Shell contract was extended (worth $27-45 million), and with it every deepwater semisubmersible in the fleet is now fully contracted through fiscal 2011 -- the roughly $1.2 billion backlog shows the 2009 stacking scare is fully behind the company.

contract award

Atwood ordered two more newbuild jackups from PPL Shipyard in Singapore at $190 million each, set to become the fleet's 12th and 13th rigs, with delivery in late 2012 -- resuming the aggressive newbuild pace after the 2009 downturn.

debt financing

Chevron Australia extended the EAGLE six more months at about $390,000/day, bridging the rig until the newbuild ATWOOD OSPREY -- Atwood's first Jurong-built semisub -- arrives for Chevron in early 2011.

contract award

The long-idle SOUTHERN CROSS finally found work: a Tunisia contract with AuDAX Resources at $154,500/day starting around June 2010, ending its stacked period.

drilling progress report

The downturn deepened: the SOUTHERN CROSS isn't expected back to work in 2009, and now the RICHMOND has joined it as ready-stacked in the Gulf of Mexico, its rate down to the low $30,000s if it can find short-term work.

production update

The BEACON's uncontracted stretch ended with a six-well (plus options) Hess Equatorial Guinea contract at $110,000/day -- the last of the fleet's downturn-era gaps to be filled.

contract award

The VICKSBURG avoided the ready-stack fate flagged the month before, winning a three-to-six-month NuCoastal contract in Thailand at $90,000-95,000/day -- modest work, but work.

contract award

The SOUTHERN CROSS's idle period is now expected to run through most or all of the fourth quarter; the VICKSBURG is undergoing an $8 million shipyard upgrade and could also end up ready-stacked afterward if no contract is found.

production update

The SOUTHERN CROSS is now confirmed ready-stacked with no contract, its operating costs being cut toward $50,000/day; the HUNTER is finishing its Israel work before moving to the big Ghana contract, and the VICKSBURG is finishing its Thailand work.

production update

For the first time in years, two rigs came up without follow-on work: the BEACON's India contract ends in July with nothing lined up after, and the VICKSBURG's Chevron Thailand contract ends in June with the same gap -- a sign the boom-era demand was cooling.

drilling progress report

Weeks after Lehman Brothers' collapse, Atwood expanded its credit capacity again -- amending its existing Nordea facility (now $200 million drawn) and adding a separate new credit agreement -- proactively shoring up liquidity as the financial crisis hit.

debt financing

The HUNTER lined up a four-year megacontract with Noble Energy and Kosmos Energy in the Eastern Mediterranean at dayrates in the $500,000s -- among Atwood's richest contracts yet -- while the EAGLE lost about $2.4 million in the quarter to unplanned downtime.

drilling progress report

The FALCON locked in a two-year South China Sea contract at a record $425,000/day, the SOUTHERN CROSS headed to West Africa at $352,000/day, and the RICHMOND rode out Hurricane Ike undamaged with no lost drilling time.

contract award

Atwood amended its $300 million credit facility to allow up to $300 million more in permitted debt, with $170 million already drawn -- more room to fund the newbuild program.

debt financing

The still-under-construction ATWOOD AURORA landed a two-year, $165,000/day contract with RWE offshore Egypt ahead of its delivery, while the SOUTHERN CROSS lined up a conditional West Africa well at $262,500/day.

contract award

Atwood ordered a third newbuild, a $750-775 million ultra-deepwater drillship from Jurong for mid-2012 delivery -- its biggest capital bet yet, and unlike the first Jurong rig, ordered without a customer contract already in hand.

debt financing

Atwood locked in a second newbuild -- a semisubmersible under construction at Jurong's Singapore yard, already contracted to Chevron Australia for three to six years at $450,000-470,000/day -- while announcing that Chevron contract itself.

debt financing

Atwood signed its first major credit facility: a $300 million, five-year revolving loan led by Nordea Bank, secured by mortgages on the EAGLE, HUNTER and BEACON -- financing firepower for the newbuild program it had just started.

debt financing

Atwood ordered its first newbuild rig, a $160 million jackup from Keppel AmFELS due by September 2008, which will become the company's ninth mobile drilling unit.

material agreement