Crescent Point Energy Corp (CPG.TO) CEO Scott Saxberg issued a firm denial when asked whether activist interest was behind a recent share price surge.

“We always welcome feedback and engagement with our shareholders – we have not, in our entire history, ever been approached by an activist and that is all I can say about that,” Saxberg said in a conference call discussing the company’s quarterly earnings on Thursday.

Crescent Point shares surged as much as 7.7 per cent last Friday, amid a report from the newsletter DealReporter that a U.S. activist had the company on its radar.

Prominent M&A lawyer Walied Soliman also told BNN Wednesday that he didn’t think there was anything to the claims.

“I think it’s been a total echo chamber, people talking at each other. I’ve seen zero evidence of anything real happening there,” Soliman told BNN.

Crescent Point reported a bigger quarterly loss from a year earlier, mainly hurt by one-time charges of about $457 million.

The oil and gas producer's net loss widened to $510.6 million, or 94 Canadian cents per share, in the fourth quarter ended Dec. 31, from $382.4 million, or 76 cents per share, a year earlier.

The quarter also included an unrealized loss on derivatives of $138.7 million. Crescent recorded one-time charges of about $589.4 million in the year ago quarter.

Total average production fell 6.3 per cent to 165,097 barrels of oil equivalent per day in the quarter.

- With files from Reuters