The Financial Post reports in its Thursday edition that Whitecap Resources says the scale it gained with its acquisition of Veren Inc. has helped drive a credit-rating upgrade, lowered borrowing costs and boosted reserves. The Post's Meghan Potkins writes that the company also secured new long-term supply deals linked to stronger U.S. and European gas prices. The oil and gas producer announced two 10-year natural gas supply deals alongside its fourth-quarter earnings. The contracts, totalling 85,000 million British thermal units per day, are tied to U.S. and European pricing benchmarks that have traded well above Western Canada's chronically discounted gas prices. "What we're looking to do is move about 50 per cent of our pricing outside of AECO, and with these two contracts here, we would be increasing our exposure outside of AECO in that eight to nine per cent range," Thanh Kang, Whitecap's chief financial officer, said on an earnings call Tuesday. Western Canada's AECO gas prices have periodically collapsed amid pipeline bottlenecks and chronic oversupply. Producers like Whitecap have weathered the volatility by focusing on oil and liquids-rich gas and moved more of their gas into U.S. and overseas markets.