Energy Stocks: Energy stocks gain; Range leaps after earnings

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) � Energy stocks rose on Wednesday, with Range Resources Corp. in the lead after it swung to a profit in the fourth quarter, beating analysts� expectations.

Range Resources Corp. shares RRC � advanced 3%. The company late Tuesday reported fourth-quarter profit of $53 million, or 32 cents a share, versus a loss of $3 million, or 2 cents a share, in the year-ago period.

Excluding certain one-off items, the company said earnings rose to 46 cents a share from 33 cents a share in the year-ago quarter. Analysts forecast earnings of 29 cents a share.

Click to Play Titanic II in the works

Clive Palmer, an Australian billionaire, is getting ready to build a new version of the Titanic that could set sail in late 2016.

Shares of Exxon Mobil Corp. XOM �gained 0.2%. Exxon won a reversal of $1.5 billion in punitive damages over a 2006 gasoline leak rural Maryland residents claimed tainted their water, Bloomberg News reported. Exxon will have a new day in court.

Chevron Corp. CVX �shares were up 0.5%. Shares of ConocoPhillips COP �added 0.2%.

Canacol Energy Ltd, a Calgary, Canada, firm that operates in Colombia, said Wednesday it will explore for shale oil with ConocoPhillips in Colombia�s Middle Magdalena basin, the Dow Jones Newswires reported.

ConocoPhillips will pay $13.5 million in cash and carry the cost of the drilling, completing and testing of up to 13 wells.

Canacol said in a statement the agreement calls for exploration and potential development of the Santa Isabel contract. ConocoPhillips will get 70% of any shale oil found in the deeper areas while Canacol would retain the other 30% and keep 100% of the rights of shallower reservoirs.

Canacol already has partnerships with Exxon and Royal Dutch Shell PLC.

Reuters Enlarge Image Protesters gather on the first day of the BP trial over the Deepwater Horizon oil rig spill.

U.S.-listed shares of BP PLC BP �declined less than 0.1%. The third day of the civil trial on the 2010 Deepwater Horizon accident was under way in New Orleans, with BP executive Lamar McKay resuming his testimony.

McKay, the president of BP America at the time of the accident, told jurors Deepwater Horizon, which BP leased from Transocean Ltd. RIG �to drill its ill-fated Macondo well, had a good safety record before it blew up, according to media reports. He said he believed safety at the well was a shared responsibility.

Transocean and Halliburton Co. HAL , which did some cement work in the well, are also defendants in the civil trial, which began Monday in New Orleans. Shares of Transocean rose 0.5%, while Halliburton shares advanced 0.8%.

McKay is currently the top executive at BP�s upstream unit.

The trial�s third day is also expected to include excerpts of a taped deposition by Tony Hayward, BP chief executive at the time of the accident.

Rig Deepwater Horizon exploded in April 2010, killing 11 workers and triggering the worst offshore spill in U.S. history.

On Tuesday, witness Robert Bea, an engineering professor, said BP�s internal investigation of the accident had been incomplete, and that BP had a culture of putting costs over safety.