Significant Accounting Policies (Policies)

6 Months Ended

Jun. 30, 2011

Policy Text Block [Abstract]

Interim Financial Statements - Basis of Accounting

The accompanying unaudited condensed consolidated financial statements of Denbury Resources Inc. and its subsidiaries have been prepared in accordance with the rules and regulations of the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) and do not include all of the information and footnotes required by Accounting Principles Generally Accepted in the United States (“U.S. GAAP”) for complete financial statements. These financial statements and the notes thereto should be read in conjunction with our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2010. Unless indicated otherwise or the context requires, the terms “we,” “our,” “us,” or “Denbury,” refer to Denbury Resources Inc. and its subsidiaries.

Interim Financial Statements - Use of Estimates

Accounting measurements at interim dates inherently involve greater reliance on estimates than at year-end and the results of operations for the interim periods shown in this report are not necessarily indicative of results to be expected for the year. In management's opinion, the accompanying unaudited condensed consolidated financial statements include all adjustments of a normal recurring nature necessary for a fair statement of our consolidated financial position as of June 30, 2011,ourconsolidated results of operations for the three andsix months ended June 30, 2011 and 2010, and our consolidated cash flows for the six months ended June 30, 2011 and 2010. Certain prior period items have been reclassified to make the classification consistent with the classification in the most recent quarter.

Noncontrolling Interest

Noncontrolling Interest

From March 9, 2010 to December 31, 2010, we owned approximately 46% of Encore Energy Partners LP (“ENP”) outstanding common units and 100% of Encore Energy Partners GP LLC (“GP LLC”), which was ENP's general partner. Considering the presumption of control of GP LLC in accordance with the Consolidation topic of the Financial Accounting Standards Board Codification (“FASC”), the results of operations and cash flows of ENP were consolidated with those of Denbury for this period. On December 31, 2010, we sold all of our ownership interests in ENP and, therefore, we did not consolidate ENP in our Unaudited Condensed Consolidated Balance Sheets as of December 31, 2010 and June 30, 2011,nor do our Unaudited Condensed Consolidated Statements of Operationsfor the three and six months ended June 30, 2011 or our Unaudited Condensed Consolidated Statement of Cash Flows for the six months ended June 30, 2011 include ENP's results of operations or cash flows.As presented in the Unaudited Condensed Consolidated Statements of Operations for the three and six months ended June 30, 2010, “Net income attributable to noncontrolling interest” of $15.0 million and $18.3 million, respectively, represents ENP's results of operations attributable to third-party ENP limited partner interest owners, other than Denbury, for the portion of that period for which we consolidated ENP.

Net Income Per Common Share

Net Income Per Common Share

Basic net income per common share is computed by dividing net income attributable to our stockholders by the weighted average number of shares of common stock outstanding during the period. Diluted net income per common share is calculated in the same manner, but also considers the impact of the potential dilution from stock options, stock appreciation rights (“SARs”), unvested restricted stock, and unvested performance equity awards. For the three and six months ended June 30, 2011 and 2010, there were no adjustments to net income attributable to our stockholders for purposes of calculating diluted net income per common share.

Basic weighted average common shares excludes 3.4million and 3.6million shares for the three and six months ended ended June 30, 2011, respectively, and 3.5 million and 3.3 million sharesfor the three and six months endedJune 30,2010, respectively, of unvested restricted stock. As these restricted shares vest or become retirement eligible, they will be included in the shares outstanding used to calculate basic net income per common share, although all restricted stock is issued and outstanding upon grant. For purposes of calculating diluted weighted average common shares, unvested restricted stock is included in the computation using the treasury stock method, with the deemed proceeds equal to the average unrecognized compensation during the period, adjusted for any estimated future tax consequences recognized directly in equity.

The following securities could potentially dilute earnings per share in the future, but were excluded from the computation of diluted net income per share as their effect would have been anti-dilutive:

	Three Months Ended		Six Months Ended
	June 30,		June 30,
In thousands	2011	2010	2011	2010
Stock options and SARs	2,412	4,223	2,297	4,785
Restricted stock	24	35	15	413

Short-term Investments

Short-term Investments

Short-term investments are available-for-sale securities recorded at fair value with any unrealized gains or losses included in accumulated other comprehensive income. At June 30,2011 and December 31, 2010, short-term investments consisted entirely of our investment in Vanguard Natural Resources LLC (“Vanguard”) common units obtained as partial consideration for the sale of our interests in ENP to a subsidiary of Vanguard on December 31, 2010. The cost basis of this investment is $93.0 million. We received distributions of $1.7 million and $3.5 million on the Vanguard common units we own for the three and six months ended June 30, 2011, respectively, which distributions are included in “Interest income and other income” on our Unaudited Condensed Consolidated Statements of Operations. The unrealized loss on our short-term investment of $7.1 million (net ofa taxbenefit of $4.4 million) and $3.0 million (net of a tax benefit of $1.8 million) for the three and six months endedJune 30,2011, respectively, is included in our Unaudited Condensed Consolidated Statements of Comprehensive Operations.

Derivatives, Policy [Policy Text Block]

We do not apply hedge accounting treatment to our oil and natural gas derivative contracts, and therefore the changes in the fair values of these instruments are recognized in income in the period of change. These fair value changes, along with the cash settlements of expired contracts are shown under “Derivatives expense (income)” in our Unaudited Condensed Consolidated Statements of Operations.

From time to time, we enter into various oil and natural gas derivative contracts to provide an economic hedge of our exposure to commodity price risk associated with anticipated future oil and natural gas production. We do not hold or issue derivative financial instruments for trading purposes. These contracts have consisted of price floors, collars and fixed price swaps. The production that we hedge has varied from year to year depending on our levels of debt and financial strength and expectation of future commodity prices. We currently employ a strategy to hedge a portion of our forecasted production for a period generally ranging fromapproximately 12 to 18 months in advance, as we believe it is important to protect our future cash flow to provide a level of assurance for our capital spending in those future periods in light of current worldwide economic uncertainties and commodity price volatility.

We manage and control market and counterparty credit risk through established internal control procedures that are reviewed on an ongoing basis. We attempt to minimize credit risk exposure to counterparties through formal credit policies, monitoring procedures, and diversification. All of our commodity derivative contracts are with parties that are lenders under our BankCredit Agreement.

Fair Value of Financial Instruments, Policy [Policy Text Block]

Fair value is the price that would be received to sell an asset or paid to transfer a liability in an orderly transaction between market participants at the measurement date (exit price). We utilize market data or assumptions that market participants would use in pricing the asset or liability, including assumptions about risk and the risks inherent in the inputs to the valuation technique. These inputs can be readily observable, market corroborated or generally unobservable. We primarily apply the market approach for recurring fair value measurements and endeavor to utilize the best available information. Accordingly, we utilize valuation techniques that maximize the use of observable inputs and minimize the use of unobservable inputs. We are able to classify fair value balances based on the observability of those inputs. The FASC establishes a fair value hierarchy that prioritizes the inputs used to measure fair value. The hierarchy gives the highest priority to unadjusted quoted prices in active markets for identical assets or liabilities (Level 1 measurement) and the lowest priority to unobservable inputs (Level 3 measurement). The three levels of the fair value hierarchy are as follows:

•       Level 1 - Quoted prices in active markets for identical assets or liabilities as of the reporting date.

•       Level 2 - Pricing inputs are other than quoted prices in active markets included in Level 1, which are either directly or indirectly observable as of the reported date. Level 2 includes those financial instruments that are valued using models or other valuation methodologies. These models are primarily industry-standard models that consider various assumptions, including quoted forward prices for commodities, time value, volatility factors, and current market and contractual prices for the underlying instruments, as well as other relevant economic measures. Substantially all of these assumptions are observable in the marketplace throughout the full term of the instrument, can be derived from observable data or are supported by observable levels at which transactions are executed in the marketplace. Instruments in this category include non-exchange-traded oil and natural gas derivatives that are based on NYMEX pricing.

•       Level 3 - Pricing inputs include significant inputs that are generally less observable from objective sources. These inputs may be used with internally developed methodologies that result in management's best estimate of fair value. Instruments in this category include non-exchange-traded natural gas derivatives swaps that are based on regional pricing other than NYMEX (e.g.,Houston Ship Channel).

We adjust the valuations for nonperformance risk, using our estimate of the counterparty's credit quality for asset positions and Denbury's credit quality for liability positions. We use multiple sources of third-party credit data in determining counterparty nonperformance risk, including credit default swaps.