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Claire Poole is a senior writer at The Texas Lawbook, where she covers corporate transactions.
Claire Poole is a business writer based in Houston. She previously was a senior writer at The Deal, where she spent 16 years covering mergers and acquisitions, private equity and investing in the energy sector. Before The Deal, she worked as a reporter and staff writer at Forbes, was editor of El Financiero International and Mexico Business and was a contributing editor at LatinTrade. She also contributed articles to Money, Worth, BusinessWeek and Texas Monthly.
Claire’s email is claire.poole@texaslawbook.net.
The attorney has more than 20 years of experience advising private equity funds and management teams on high profile deals across the energy sector. EnCap Flatrock Midstream is one of her regular clients.
Energy transition is proving itself more complicated than expected, and legacy energy more durable. Whether upstream or midstream, energy M&A in 2023 managed to endure the diverse pressures of war, politics, inflation and price volatility to emerge, as TPH&Co., the energy business of boutique bankers Perella Weinberg, describes it: "more important and dynamic than ever." This week's CDT Roundup looks at their interesting year-end reflections, along with 17 deals reported during the final week of the year, as well as the firms and lawyers who worked on them.
Oxy's back. With its $12 billion acquisition of CrownRock last week, Occidental Petroleum not only joined other energy giants in the great consolidation of Texas oil production, but in the process seems to have shaken off the burden of its nearly disastrous $57 billion absorption of Anadarko Petroleum in 2018. Still, some observers think some of the same risks of overcommitment — not to mention regulatory concerns — are lurking in even this more modest deal. The CDT Roundup looks at those concerns, as well as the other deals reported from Texas by 280 lawyers.
It's not that unusual, particularly in these days of energy consolidation, to have three billion-dollar deals. But this week saw three billion-dollar deals in three completely different business sectors: pharma, airlines and clean energy. The Roundup takes a look at the whys behind those deals, along with a huge menu of 26 deals, including 10 capital markets transactions (one of which was a very rare IPO and none of which involved Shohei Ohtani). And, of course, the names of the 244 lawyers who worked on them.
Last week's announcement of a new joint venture between Sentinel Midstream and ExxonMobil connecting Louisiana pipelines marked more than another O&G consolidation. It was another deal to be tallied in what has been a remarkable year for Willkie Farr & Gallagher's Houston partner, Archie Fallon. As we head into the final month of 2023, the CDT Roundup looks at his major deals on the year, along with those of the 57 mostly Texas lawyers who reported transactions for the week following the Thanksgiving holiday.
The Simpson team was co-led by partner Christopher May in Houston. KKR already served as Global Atlantic’s asset manager for the last three years, offering access to its global investment and origination capabilities for the benefit of GA’s policyholders.
BlackRock is a dirty name, at least among some Texas legislators, for its vigorous investments in energy transition. But it is also the world's largest asset manager with $9.42 trillion under management. This week's CDT Roundup looks at BlackRock and the law firms whose Texas offices often count BlackRock as a client. That, along with the Texas lawyers and firms behind the nine deals reported during the holiday-shortened week.
Houston deal lawyer Jon Daly has counseled a range of clients so far this year, including Intrepid Partners, Blue Ocean Acquisition Corp. and Sunoco on M&A and Western Midstream Partners and JP Morgan on capital markets.
Sometimes the biggest deal of the week tells us something beyond just its value. Last week, the last full week before Thanksgiving, the deal with the largest reported value involved healthcare. And according to the consulting firm Kaufman Hall, the $2.4 billion sale of three hospitals by Texas healthcare giant Tenet Healthcare is part of a resurgence of M&A in the medical space. This week's CDT Roundup focuses on that uptick, as well as the usual roll call of Texas firms and lawyers who reported deals as the holiday season approaches.
A recent Mergermarket survey of top global private equity executives yielded few surprises concerning the once and future deal environment. The survey, conducted on behalf of Dechert, revealed that more than a quarter of respondents cited interest rates as the most important factor in determining deal development in the next 12 months. Among the few surprises, however, was the overwhelming and newly found attraction to take-private deals. The Roundup looks at the data, as well as the firms and lawyers behind 15 Texas-related transactions reported last week.
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