Oil and gas firm Eclipse Resources files for IPO-Reuters

(Reuters) – Oil and gas company Eclipse Resources Corp filed with U.S. regulators for an initial public offering of common stock that would raise about $100 million.

Citigroup, Goldman Sachs & Co and Morgan Stanley are the lead underwriters for the IPO, the company said in a filing with the U.S Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday.

The company, backed by private equity firm EnCap Investments LP, has over 90,000 acres in the Utica shale and 20,000 acres in the Marcellus shale, both in Ohio.

Eclipse also shares some acreage with Warburg Pincus-backed Antero Resources Corp, which had a stronger-than-expected market debut in October last year.

Chief Executive Benjamin Hulburt told Reuters in an interview in November that Eclipse was considering an IPO that could come around the middle of this year.

Hulburt previously co-founded Rex Energy Corp in 2001 and took the company public in 2007.

Eclipse intends to list its common stock on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol “ECR”.

Net proceeds from the offering would be used for capital expenditure and general corporate purposes, the Pennsylvania-based company said in the filing.

Eclipse reported a net loss of $11.99 million on total revenue of $24.8 million for the three months ended March 31.

The filing did not reveal how many shares the company planned to sell or their expected price.

The amount of money a company says it plans to raise in its first IPO filings is used to calculate registration fees. The final size of the IPO could be different.