Dallas Dealmakers Talk Oil, Company Growth and Local Opportunity

This spring we continued our 2015 events program with our Dallas Summit, where just under 100 private investment bankers, private equity professionals, boutique M&A advisors, family offices and senior leaders gathered to network offline.

For the first time at a Summit, we were excited to survey attendee investors, lenders and advisors to find out they were thinking about local investment opportunities and the dealmaking environment. With 83% hailing from Dallas and all survey respondents actively sourcing deals in the region, they were able to provide some interesting insights into deals in Dallas.

Insider Insights

In general, 61% of respondents said M&A is the #1 growth strategy for companies in the Dallas region, but although 39% said deal size is increasing, 80% emphasized that they believe this M&A growth has caused companies to overvalue themselves.

Opportunity Outlook

In response to questions about the next best investment opportunities in Dallas, attendees were excited about growth in Biotech & Life Sciences (23%), Real Estate (%18), and Tech & Telecom. They also predicted that these deals are likely to be debt financings (32%), asset acquisitions (27%) and equity financings (27%).

Oil Predictions

A survey on regional business activity for Dallas wouldn’t be complete without some insight into the oil and energy markets, where 41% of respondent predicted year-end 2015 oil prices would hover around $60-69 a barrel. If oil price recovery were to take place in H2 2015, 36% of respondents gauged that it would take 1-2 years for energy deal flow to return to 2007 levels. Remaining responses were equally split between a longer 2+ years, a quick 6 months – 1 year, and being unsure about how long it would take to get back to 2007 deal flow.

Dallas Summit attendees were also asked to speculate about when the U.S. will allow crude oil exports, and responses were across the board. Although nearly 70% of respondents believed exports would be allowed within 1-3 years, 13% believed that it would never happen.

Through the survey and attendance at the Summit, it’s clear that excitement for investment is high. Dallas is an active regional market, and there’s no shortage of opportunities for growth.