Continental Resources, Inc. is a petroleum and natural gas exploration and production company headquartered in Oklahoma City. The company was founded by

Harold Hamm Harold Glenn Hamm (born December 11, 1945) is an American entrepreneur in the oil and gas business. He is known for extracting shale oil resources. , Hamm's net worth is estimated to be billion, making him the 63rd wealthiest person in the wor ...

in 1967 at the age of 21 as Shelly Dean Oil Company, originally named for Hamm's two daughters. In 1990, Shelly Dean re-branded itself as Continental Resources. It primarily used

hydraulic fracturing Fracking (also known as hydraulic fracturing, hydrofracturing, or hydrofracking) is a well stimulation technique involving the fracturing of bedrock formations by a pressurized liquid. The process involves the high-pressure injection of "frack ...

and directional drilling to produce from low permeability formations. The company's assets are primarily in the

Bakken formation The Bakken Formation () is a rock unit from the Late Devonian to Early Mississippian age occupying about of the subsurface of the Williston Basin, underlying parts of Montana, North Dakota, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. The formation was initi ...

in North Dakota and Montana, the STACK and SCOOP plays in Oklahoma, and the

Permian Basin The Permian ( ) is a geologic period and stratigraphic system which spans 47 million years from the end of the Carboniferous Period million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Triassic Period 251.9 Mya. It is the last period of the Paleoz ...

. In 2021, total production was per day, of which 49% was petroleum and 51% was natural gas. It is ranked 818th on the

Fortune 500 The ''Fortune'' 500 is an annual list compiled and published by ''Fortune'' magazine that ranks 500 of the largest United States corporations by total revenue for their respective fiscal years. The list includes publicly held companies, along ...

History

In 1967,

founded Shelly Dean Oil Co., Continental's predecessor. In 1990, the company was renamed Continental Resources. In 1995, the company discovered what was later described as the Cedar Hills Field in North Dakota, the 7th largest onshore field in the lower 48 United States ranked by liquid proved reserves, and was the first to develop it exclusively through precision horizontal drilling. In 2003, the company drilled its first wells in the

. In 2004, the company completed the Robert Heuer 1-17R in Divide County, the 1st commercially successful well in the North Dakota Bakken to be both horizontally drilled and completed using

. In 2007, the company became a public company via an initial public offering in which

sold approximately $300 million worth of his shares. In 2008, the company was the first to complete a horizontal well in the Three Forks zone. In 2010, Continental introduced the ECO-Pad® drilling technique, which involves drilling 4 wells from 1 pad. This reduced the cost of drilling and increased production output. In 2012, the company moved its headquarters from Enid, Oklahoma to Oklahoma City. In 2016, the company sold assets in North Dakota and Montana for $222 million. In 2017, the company sold 26,000 acres in the Arkoma Basin for $68 million. In 2021, the company acquired 92,000 net leasehold acres and 50,000 net royalty acres in the

from Pioneer Natural Resources for $3.25 billion.

References

External links

* {{Authority control 1967 establishments in Oklahoma Companies based in Oklahoma City Companies formerly listed on the New York Stock Exchange Energy companies established in 1967 Natural gas companies of the United States Non-renewable resource companies established in 1967 Oil companies of the United States Petroleum in Oklahoma