Laredo Petroleum

MIDLAND A Tulsa oil executive told a crowd of oil and gas professionals his fourth “opportunistic” oil company, Laredo Petroleum, will aggressively seek leases to drill on in the Permian Basin.

Randy Foutch, chairman, chief executive officer and president of Laredo Petroleum, has utilized private equity and that aggressive philosophy to build four successful oil companies — Colt Resources started in 1991, Lariat Petroleum in 1996, Latigo Petroleum in 2002 and Laredo which he launched this year.

All his companies have been focused on the Mid-Continent and the Permian Basin.

“It’s a wonderful place for a company to go and build significant (oil and gas) reserves,” Foutch told the crowd of 191 present for the luncheon at the Petroleum Club in Midland.

“We’re going to try to make those acquisitions that lead us to significant drilling,” Foutch said.

The speaker also touched on what he foresees as a resurgence of the Cold War in the field of energy with Russia and China controlling a majority of the oil and gas in the world. Oil companies now control a large majority of the oil and gas around the world and due to political conflict, that energy will become a pawn of the chess game in the war.

“There will be a significant amount of oil we won’t have access to,” Foutch said.

And, he added pointedly, “They are not abiding by the same rules we are abiding by.”

Foutch was introduced by Permian Basin Petroleum Association President Kirk Edwards.

Some of those present obviously were there to learn from Foutch’s talk.

Bailey Morgan with H2Oil Recovery in Andrews said, “I thought he did a very good job of telling how to grow a company.

“We’re a new company, and it’s good to hear from somebody like him who has been so successful,” he said.