American Oil and Gas Reporter - January 2012 - 103

Outlook 2012

Financiers Expand Oil, Gas Divisions
By Colter Cookson
Investors, bankers and producers share
at least one trait: They need to carefully
balance risk and reward. Now more than
ever, producers can use ever-improving
technology and ever-expanding geological
databases to boost returns from once marginal wells and turn previously uneconomic
wells into promising opportunities.
Today, producers have another advantage: High oil prices and anticipated longterm demand growth have spurred investors and bankers alike to commit
capital to oil and gas.
"The oil and gas sector is robust,"
says Sylvia Barnes, managing director
and head of KeyBanc Capital Markets'
oil and gas group, which recently doubled
in size and opened an office in Houston.
"The sector is almost a defensive play
for investors because it offers tangible
assets, commodity prices with a degree
of stability, and the ability to hedge for
right-way risk."
Because of those factors, Barnes says
KeyBanc is seeing investors-particularly
those in the high-yield sector-rotate out
of areas such as high technology and
heavy industry in favor of oil and gas.
"This is beneficial to producers, as they
can access high-yield capital and credit
at lower prices," she observes.
Investors and investment banks such
as KeyBanc Capital Markets are far from
the only ones that are expanding their
stakes in oil and gas. Other participants
include commercial lenders such as Mutual
of Omaha Bank, Community National
Bank of Midland, Tx., and F&M Bank
of Tulsa and Dallas, as well as private
equity firm EnCap Flatrock Midstream.
All of the banks say they view oil and
gas as a way to diversify and expand their
income bases. "Oil and gas is one of our
five core focus areas, but it accounts for
less than a fifth of KeyBanc's revenues
and profits," Barnes says. "I see my job as
growing the oil and gas teams' relative
contributions so they are closer to the
other areas, such as real estate, industrial,
and utilities."
Achieving Growth
According to Barnes, KeyBanc Capital
Markets provides everything from lending

and underwriting to advice on mergers
and acquisitions for independent oil and
gas companies. "Since KeyBanc is the
14th largest bank in America, we clearly
have the resources to do that," she says.
"We have limited exposure to international
volatility, so those resources put us in a
fantastic position to grow."
To achieve its goals, KeyBanc Capital
Markets opened a Houston office and
hired a team of seasoned oil and gas investment bankers, including Michael Klayman, Daniel Welch, Jonna Huneryager
and Cole Ciaburri. This team will be supported by one in Dallas that consists of
three investment bankers, three portfolio
managers, and an on-staff engineer. "We
also have well-established, experienced,
and qualified sales and trading teams both
in public equity and high yield, as well as
extensive commodity derivative and oil
and gas advisory experience," Barnes
comments.
Those teams' location in Houston and
Dallas is a great benefit, Barnes continues.
"We are a part of the oil patch community,
so we have a greater understanding of the

SYLVIA BARNES
Managing Director and Head of Oil & Gas
KeyBanc Capital Markets

dynamics than we would if we were flying
in from New York," she relates. "We get
to compare notes with thought leaders at
industry functions and gain a better sense
of their priorities and concerns, which
helps us effectively address their needs."
The close-knit nature of the oil and
gas community makes a good reputation
vital, Barnes observes. "It takes decades
to build a reputation here, but only a few
minutes to destroy it," she says.
Barnes says her team has built its
credibility by being honest about its capabilities and putting its clients' interests
first. "We are not just looking for a fee,"
she stresses. "We will tell clients if they
should develop properties more before
selling them, suggest using joint ventures
if that is more appropriate for their goals,
and take the time to come up with creative
structures that give them an advantage."
Barnes adds that clients will get senior
banker focus from the start of a project
to the end. "The senior teams' hands-on
approach and our teams' specialization
in oil and gas ensures that clients get
help from people who understand the industry well enough to meet their needs
and tell investors why they should be excited about an opportunity," she says.
Reserve-Based Lender
In July, Mutual of Omaha Bank
launched its oil and gas lending group by
hiring George McKean, who has 25 years'
experience with banks and producers, as
manager of energy lending. "Mutual of
Omaha Bank has expanded into the oil
and gas sector to round out its business
focus, which traditionally had been concentrated on real estate and commercial
and industrial lending," he says.
Senior Energy Lender Ed Fenk, a certified petroleum geologist with 30 years'
experience in energy lending and exploration and production, says the upstream
sector has been a hotbed of debt financing
activity. "High oil prices and the need to
replace reserves have driven producers
to increase spending on their organic activities and acquisitions, which has translated to a need for more energy credits,"
he explains.
Mutual of Omaha Bank hopes to provide those credits not only to upstream
companies, but also to midstream comJANUARY 2012 103

American Oil and Gas Reporter - January 2012

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