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Loans to the oil and gas industry in 1999 totaled $59.2 billion, senior financial editor Brian A. Toal reports, in this month's cover story, "Capital Malls." The figure is down significantly from the $83.9 billion of 1998, according to Loan Pricing Corp. But bankers want to do more business than lending. "Lenders-more mindful than ever of their own returns to shareholders-want to go beyond simply putting their balance sheets at risk for reserve-based loans," Toal writes. One banker was blunt. "If all an oil and gas company wants is my money-and no other service-that's not for me," he told Toal. Steve Antry, president and a founder of Beta Oil & Gas Inc., isn't this banker's dream. Antry's capital-raising philosophy is to put together just what the company needs, only when it needs it, and usually without outside help. He finds the investors himself, from a database he has been developing for more than a decade, associate editor Paula Dittrick reports, in "The Other IPO." Beta's initial public offering last year went virtually unnoticed, in contrast to that of Spinnaker Exploration Co. "I think a lot of companies make a strategic error in their early stages with a philosophy of getting all the money they can when it's available. The problem with that methodology is that you are bringing in money that is dilutive to all shareholders," Antry says. Next in Oil and Gas Investor this month is a lesson in how to regain investor interest in E&P stocks: "Free Cash Flow: Back to Basics," by guest authors Andrew T. Lees and Paul R. Leibman of Petrie Parkman & Co. in Denver. "The status quo approach to valuing companies in the E&P sector now needs to be seriously questioned," they write. Free cash flow may be more telling. "Simply put, FCF is the amount of internally generated funds available to grow a company." Cash flow is among fiscal indicators examined in "A Fuller Disclosure," by guest author Bill A. Marko, a Houston-based business management consultant. And, recently reattracting investor interest is Baker Hughes Inc. whose Western Geophysical business is making itself a part of the next chapter in the oilfield service company's story. Gary E. Jones, Western's new president, talks to associate editor Dittrick in "A New Dimension." Meanwhile, Canadian E&P companies are wondering if they will be in the next chapter of the Canadian M&A story, according to "Cleanup Time," the biannual report on Canadian E&P M&A. "The CEOs are saying they probably should get together [and merge their companies] but they're not sure of market reaction," says Brian Imrie, managing director of Credit Suisse First Boston's Toronto energy practice. In all, a tumultuous time in the oil and gas industry. Same business, different day. -Nissa Darbonne, Managing Editor
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