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by Stockwatch Business Reporter

West Texas Intermediate crude for March delivery added 86 cents to $53.86 on the New York Merc, while Brent for April added $1.03 to $56.70 (all figures in this para U.S.). Western Canadian Select traded at a discount of $13.40 to WTI ($40.46), unchanged. Natural gas for March lost nine cents to $3.03. The TSX energy index added 1.96 points to close at 204.08.

Alberta producer Athabasca Oil Corp. (ATH) added seven cents to $1.80 on 8.57 million shares, after announcing a refinancing arrangement that will conclude its roughly year-long quest to "transform the company." This time last year, Athabasca had production of about 15,000 barrels of oil equivalent a day from its thermal and light oil assets, and it had nearly $840-million in long-term debt, including $550-million in notes due in November, 2017. Since then, the company has closed a nearly $500-million light oil joint venture with Murphy Oil, sold over $300-million in royalties on thermal assets, repaid about $250-million in debt, and boosted its production to around 40,000 barrels a day by acquiring Statoil's thermal assets for $435-million and 100 million shares (thus giving Statoil a 19.7-per-cent interest in the company). Athabasca was not finished yet and said it wanted to establish a reserve-based credit facility and refinance its $550-million 2017 notes. Yesterday evening, it did both. The reserve-based facility is good for $120-million, and the 2017 notes will be retired using the proceeds from a new note offering for $450-million (U.S.). The new notes will not be due until 2022 and are not subject to financial covenants. They also bear a much higher interest rate of nearly 9.9 per cent, compared with the 7.5-per-cent rate on the 2017 notes. Separately, Athabasca has sold another royalty on its thermal assets, this time for $90-million.

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