The Mergermarket year-end polling is out and the results are optimistic. More than 60 percent of decision-maker respondents from 300 corporate and PE firms predict overall increases in M&A, despite the ongoing threat of inflation and continued geopolitical challenges. The CDT Roundup has details of the survey, as well as which markets they are predicting will prosper. As always, there are the names of Texas lawyers who advised on 14 deals reported last week.
Texas Capital Bank’s Anna Alvarado: “Lawyers are expected to be strategic partners”
Last month Texas Capital Bank closed a $3.4 billion sale of its insurance premium finance unit, BankDirect Capital Finance. At the center of that transaction was Anna Alvarado, general counsel of TCB. In a Q&A with Claire Poole, Alvarado discusses that deal, her views on lawyers in the banking business and the steep trajectory of a work life that began picking grapes.
CDT Roundup: 14 Deals, 12 Firms, 88 Lawyers, $10.1B
Houston-based NRG Energy made news last week with their $5.2 billion acquisition Vivint Smart Home Inc. The deal included the assumption of $2.4 billion in debt, and was immediately unpopular with the market, but the company says the deal’s expansion of its retail utility product line is worth the price. The CDT Roundup has the lawyers behind that deal, as well as 13 others and a bonus Q&A with Latham partner Ravi Purohit, who has reported several high-profile deals in recent weeks.
CDT Roundup: 8 Deals, 5 Firms, 74 Lawyers, $2.3B
You may remember traditional IPOs — those initial public offerings popular before the market eruption of SPACs. Are they making a comeback? Maybe. A $2 billion IPO announced this week by BKV Corp. may hold a clue to the future. But in any case, BKV’s recent acquisition tear makes it worth watching. The CDT Roundup has more on that BKV deal, as well as the names of Texas lawyers who announced deals during a holiday-shortened week.
CDT Roundup: 21 Deals, 15 Firms, 212 Lawyers, $2.9B
As financing costs continue to endure at higher levels, no region seems to have been spared a drop in deal value — even when deals continue at an active pace. A recent Mergermarket report notes that even in the southern U.S., often a statistical outlier, the value of mergers and acquisitions are depressed as smaller deals in sectors like technology and communications gain in number. The CDT Roundup has more on the Mergermarket report, naming a few of the big deals that led the quarter — along with a cavalcade of Texas lawyers who reported their involvement in 21 transactions last week.
Diamondback Grabs Midland Basin Properties from Lario Oil for $1.4B
Kirkland advised the buyer and V&E the seller in what is proving to be a dramatic pickup in second-half oil and gas deals.
CDT Roundup: 13 Deals, 9 Firms, 81 Lawyers, $14.8B
So much attention has been given to energy and energy transition that it would be easy to overlook other business sectors that make up the Texas M&A market. Take the healthcare sector, for instance. Healthcare has become a new favorite among PE investors, according to PitchBook. This week’s Roundup looks at a few of the reasons for that, as well as healthcare stats for Texas. All that, and the usual roster of lawyers involved in last week’s Texas-related transactions.
Eversheds Sutherland Energy M&A Attorneys Headed to Holland & Knight
Three Houston attorneys who advised on a $1.8 billion forestry ESG deal last week are on the move to Holland & Knight.
Winston Counsels Chart Industries on $4.4B Acquisition of Howden
The two major producers of industrial equipment say the merger will allow both the scale and profitability to support their strategic orientation toward decarbonization and other clean alternative energy processes. Claire Poole reports.
CDT Roundup: 25 Deals, 16 Firms, 509 Lawyers, $19B
Is the M&A market becoming a competition between “haves” and “have nots?” Maybe so, according to a recently released survey of nationwide dealmakers conducted by Dykema. Nearly two-thirds of respondents expect the U.S. M&A market to improve in the coming year. But for whom? Where companies with record amounts of cash on hand see opportunity, those who operate as borrowers see obstacles. The Roundup has more on the Dykema report, along with more than 500 names of mostly-Texas lawyers who worked on 25 deals reported last week to the Corporate Deal Tracker. It was, in that way, a record-breaking week.