We have audited the accompanying consolidated balance sheets of Swift Energy Company and subsidiaries as of December 31, 2003 and 2002, and the related consolidated statements of income, stockholders’ equity, and cash flows for each of the two years in the period ended December 31, 2003. These financial statements are the responsibility of the Company’s management. Our responsibility is to express an opinion on these financial statements based on our audits. The consolidated financial statements of Swift Energy Company and subsidiaries for the year ended December 31, 2001, were audited by other auditors who have ceased operations and whose report dated February 18, 2002, expressed an unqualified opinion on those statements.

We conducted our audits in accordance with auditing standards generally accepted in the United States. Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the financial statements are free of material misstatement. An audit includes examining, on a test basis, evidence supporting the amounts and disclosures in the financial statements. An audit also includes assessing the accounting principles used and significant estimates made by management, as well as evaluating the overall financial statement presentation. We believe that our audits provide a reasonable basis for our opinion.

In our opinion, the 2002 and 2003 financial statements referred to above present fairly, in all material respects, the consolidated financial position of Swift Energy Company and subsidiaries at December 31, 2003 and 2002, and the consolidated results of their operations and their cash flows for each of the two years in the period ended December 31, 2003 in conformity with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States.

As discussed in Note 1 to the consolidated financial statements, in 2003 the Company changed its method of accounting for asset retirement obligations.