Henry Benton, a partner in Troutman Pepper Locke’s Energy Practice Group, was quoted in the May 5, 2025 The Dallas Morning News article, “OPEC Sends Oil Prices Reeling, but What’s Good for Texas Drivers May Not Be for Drillers.”

Henry Benton, a Dallas partner at Troutman Pepper Locke LLP, said the price drop will impact the oil and gas mergers and acquisitions market. Energy-related deals had already cooled in connection with the pricing volatility the last few months.

“Increasingly, companies that planned to sell assets into what had been expected to be an active year for oil & gas M&A in 2025 are pulling their assets off the market and are going to wait for a better pricing environment,” Benton said.

He added that the production side will also feel impacts.

“In terms of what this means from a production standpoint — when you combine this with what had already been a choppy few months economically — I would expect rig count will go down and producers will continue to be very disciplined in how they deploy resources on the production side until oil prices stabilize,” Benton added.

 

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