Top Texas M&A Deals of 2018
Here are the top 50 M&A transactions involving Texas-headquartered companies in 2018 as compiled exclusively for The Texas Lawbook by Mergermarket.
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Here are the top 50 M&A transactions involving Texas-headquartered companies in 2018 as compiled exclusively for The Texas Lawbook by Mergermarket.
Barclays and Goldman Sachs top the 2018 league tables for investment banks advising on Texas deals. But the real story in exclusive Mergermarket data provided to The Texas Lawbook may be the trend toward fewer but bigger deals in the state and elsewhere. Claire Poole explains.
Locked in a five-year battle with V&E for top M&A firm in Texas, Kirkland represented more Texas-based companies in 2018 than any law firm in Texas history. New Mergermarket rankings show a growing separation between Kirkland and V&E, and even more separation between V&E and the rest of the pack. The Texas Lawbook has the details.
Last year, 2018, was a good one for M&A. The deal count, a 12-year high, may have been the highest for Texas companies ever. The value of those deals was the second-best since 2007. But a sluggish fourth quarter gives pause for the new year, one that a Mergermarket expert describes as big dealmaking "in search of a catalyst." Claire Poole explains.
The management of Luby’s Inc. chalked up a big win on Friday – and so did several Sidley lawyers in Texas. The Houston-based restaurant chain beat back a proxy fight by Bandera, a New York-based investment firm run by Jeff Gramm, son of former U.S. Sen. Phil Gramm. Claire Poole has the details.

It’s not much fun to be general counsel of a company going through a sale which, if successful, would likely put you out of a job. But Jim Mutrie handled his company’s $9.5 billion sale to Concho Resources last year like a pro. Now he's RSP Permian's former general counsel and a finalist for an Outstanding Corporate Counsel Award.

EnLink Midstream Partners CLO Alaina Brooks and Deputy GC Kendall Talbott have been a team for a half-dozen years. Together, they implemented a $13 billion simplification, brought several midstream projects online, eliminated dozens of nuisance lawsuits and sold a $3.12 billion interest in EnLink. Now they’re finalists for an ACC-DFW award.
Dallas private equity financier Newstone Capital Partners is aiming to raise $1.25 billion for a fourth fund, according to a recent regulatory filing.
There are lots of reasons for mergers and acquisitions: to simplify corporate structure; to diversify product mix; to extend geographic reach. There is also the need for cash: to pay down debt, to boost shareholder return or to invest in lucrative prospects. In her Top 10 Texas M&A Deals, Claire Poole found an array of those motives on display in 2018.

Middle market M&A has been eroding across the nation, and even in the otherwise thriving Texas market Texas-headquartered firms will likely finish 2018 with less than 200 mid-range transactions for the first time since the Great Recession. Below, courtesy of Mergermarket, here’s how financial advisors stack up by total deal values in the mid-range market…
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