* CEO statements follows $3 billion loan announcement
* Sales still targeting $9.5-$11 bln this year
* Shares rise 6 pct in early trade
(Adds background, updates shares)
May 14 (Reuters) – Chesapeake Energy Corp sought to
calm Wall Street worries about its financial position, telling
investors on Monday it was confident it would complete assets
sales to plug a funding gap estimated at $10 billion this year.
“We will get our assets sales done,” Chief Executive Aubrey
McClendon told a conference call with analysts and investors.
Late Friday, Chesapeake said it had received a new $3
billion loan from Goldman Sachs Group Inc and Jefferies
Group Inc to pay down an existing debt facility.
The loan is designed to give it breathing room to complete
the planned sales of properties in West Texas’ Permian Basin and
the Mississippi Lime field in northern Oklahoman and southern
Kansas, which are part of a slate of sales the company says will
raise $9.5 billion to $11 billion this year.
Shares in Chesapeake slumped 14 percent on Friday after the
company issued its delayed quarterly regulatory filing, and said
it could put off some asset sales to preserve income needed to
comply with debt obligations.
Chesapeake has been caught in a corporate governance
controversy since Reuters reported last month that McClendon had
mortgaged his personal stakes in the company’s oil and gas wells
to companies that had lent money to the company.
Shares in Chesapeake were up 6 percent to $15.70 per share
in early trading.
(Reporting By Anna Driver in Houston Matt Daily in New York;
Editing by Gerald E. McCormick and Jeffrey Benkoe)
