UPDATE 1-Devon Energy lowers full-year expenditure forecast

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Oct 29 (Reuters) - Devon Energy Corp on Thursday slightly lowered its spending forecast for the year and pointed to improving activity ahead, benefiting from better well performance and a recovery in oil prices.
A more than 30% plunge in crude prices this year forced cash-strapped shale operators to try to eke out more efficiency from existing wells instead of drilling new ones while cutting costs, laying off employees and increasingly, consolidating to survive the downturn.
Last month, Devon agreed to buy shale rival WPX Energy Inc in an all-stock deal, as oil producers increasingly turn to consolidation to find ways to grow in lower oil price environment while keeping their costs in check.
Devon said it now expects exploration and production capital expenditure to be between $950 million and $990 million, $10 million lower at the top end of an earlier forecast, its third reduction to the budget since March.
The company also raised its full-year production forecast to between 152,000 to 154,000 barrels per day barrels of oil per day (bpd) from 148,000 to 152,000 bpd.
Devon, which has a foothold in the Delaware portion of the Permian basin of Texas and New Mexico, reported net production from retained assets of 326,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day in the third quarter, up marginally from last year.

(Reporting by Rithika Krishna; Editing by Maju Samuel and
Shounak Dasgupta)
((Rithika.Krishna@thomsonreuters.com)