SemGroup Corporation was a publicly-traded company engaged in

natural gas Natural gas (also called fossil gas or simply gas) is a naturally occurring mixture of gaseous hydrocarbons consisting primarily of methane in addition to various smaller amounts of other higher alkanes. Low levels of trace gases like carbo ...

petroleum Petroleum, also known as crude oil, or simply oil, is a naturally occurring yellowish-black liquid mixture of mainly hydrocarbons, and is found in geological formations. The name ''petroleum'' covers both naturally occurring unprocessed crud ...

, and

propane Propane () is a three-carbon alkane with the molecular formula . It is a gas at standard temperature and pressure, but compressible to a transportable liquid. A by-product of natural gas processing and petroleum refining, it is commonly used a ...

pipeline transport Pipeline transport is the long-distance transportation of a liquid or gas through a system of pipes—a pipeline—typically to a market area for consumption. The latest data from 2014 gives a total of slightly less than of pipeline in 120 countr ...

. It was organized in

Delaware Delaware ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Maryland to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and New Jersey and the Atlantic Ocean to its east. The state takes its name from the adjacent Del ...

and headquartered in

Tulsa, Oklahoma Tulsa () is the second-largest city in the state of Oklahoma and 47th-most populous city in the United States. The population was 413,066 as of the 2020 census. It is the principal municipality of the Tulsa Metropolitan Area, a region with ...

. In December 2019, the company was acquired by

Energy Transfer LP Energy Transfer LP is an American company engaged in natural gas and propane pipeline transport. It is organized under Delaware state laws and headquartered in Dallas, Texas. It was founded in 1995 by Ray Davis and Kelcy Warren, who remains Ch ...

. SemGroup LP was engaged in diversified services for the North American

crude oil Petroleum, also known as crude oil, or simply oil, is a naturally occurring yellowish-black liquid mixture of mainly hydrocarbons, and is found in geological formations. The name ''petroleum'' covers both naturally occurring unprocessed crude ...

and refined products industry. Operations included gathering, transporting, marketing and hedging services. SemGroup owned and operated carrier pipelines, oil terminals, oil transport and service trucks, pipeline injection stations and terminal storage in

Oklahoma Oklahoma (; Choctaw language, Choctaw: ; chr, ᎣᎧᎳᎰᎹ, ''Okalahoma'' ) is a U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States, bordered by Texas on the south and west, Kansas on the nor ...

Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...

Kansas Kansas () is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its capital is Topeka, and its largest city is Wichita. Kansas is a landlocked state bordered by Nebraska to the north; Missouri to the east; Oklahoma to the south; and Colorado to the ...

, and

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...

. Canadian operations were located in

Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...

British Columbia British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, ...

, and

Saskatchewan Saskatchewan ( ; ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Western Canada, western Canada, bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, to the northeast by Nunavut, and on t ...

. SemCAMS Midstream ULC was a business unit of SemGroup based in Calgary, Alberta. SemCAMS operated four gas processing plants in the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin. SemCAMS offers midstream service options for wet or dry, sweet or sour gas gathering and processing, as well as dehydration, field compression and sulfur forming and handling. Houston Fuel Oil Terminal Company was acquired by SemGroup in July 2017. Often referred to as 'HFOTCO,' the business unit operated one of the largest oil terminals in the U.S. HFOTCO is in the Houston Ship Channel on the U.S. Gulf Coast. Rose Rock Midstream was a master limited partnership formed by SemGroup in 2011. It was originally publicly traded but fully acquired by SemGroup in September 2016.

History

SemGroup LP was founded in 2000. In July 2007, the company established a publicly traded affiliate, SemGroup Energy Partners LP. In 2007, it was the 18th largest private company in the US.

Bankruptcy

Hedge funds A hedge fund is a pooled investment fund that trades in relatively liquid assets and is able to make extensive use of more complex trading, portfolio-construction, and risk management techniques in an attempt to improve performance, such as shor ...

run by Alerian Capital Management and Elliot Associates exercised the terms of a

secured loan A secured loan is a loan in which the borrower pledges some asset (e.g. a car or property) as collateral for the loan, which then becomes a secured debt owed to the creditor who gives the loan. The debt is thus secured against the collateral, an ...

made to SemGroup and took over the general partnership interest in SemGroup Energy Partners LP. On July 22, 2008, Semgroup, LP filed for

Chapter 11 Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code (Title 11 of the United States Code) permits reorganization under the bankruptcy laws of the United States. Such reorganization, known as Chapter 11 bankruptcy, is available to every business, wheth ...

bankruptcy protection in

U.S. Bankruptcy Court United States bankruptcy courts are courts created under Article I of the United States Constitution. The current system of bankruptcy courts was created by the United States Congress in 1978, effective April 1, 1984. United States bankruptcy c ...

Wilmington, Delaware Wilmington ( Lenape: ''Paxahakink /'' ''Pakehakink)'' is the largest city in the U.S. state of Delaware. The city was built on the site of Fort Christina, the first Swedish settlement in North America. It lies at the confluence of the Christina ...

. New York

billionaire A billionaire is a person with a net worth of at least one billion (1,000,000,000, i.e., a thousand million) units of a given currency, usually of a major currency such as the United States dollar, euro, or pound sterling. The American busin ...

John Catsimatidis John A. Catsimatidis (born September 7, 1948) is an American billionaire businessman and radio talk show host. He is the owner, president, chairman, and CEO of Gristedes Foods, a grocery chain in Manhattan, and the Red Apple Group, a real estat ...

then became engaged in efforts to take over SemGroup and gained control over a majority of the company's management committee. He was opposed by the company's existing management, who argued for selling off at least some of the company's assets, while Catsimatidis stated his intention to keep the company together. On February 11, 2009 Catsimatidis was sued by a group of SemGroup executives, seeking removal of Catsimatidis and his allies from the committee. The company and its unsecured creditors committee sued former CEO Thomas L. Kivisto and former CFO Gregory C. Wallace, seeking return of $362 million that they claim the defendants used for their own transactions and benefits. In April 2009, former FBI director

Louis Freeh Louis Joseph Freeh (born January 6, 1950) is an American attorney and former judge who served as the fifth Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation from September 1993 to June 2001. Graduated from Rutgers University and New York Universi ...

released a report on the circumstances surrounding the SemGroup bankruptcy, claiming it was a result of lies by its top executives about its liquidity problems and a mismanaged speculative oil trading strategy. In July 2009, Catsimatidis settled with the company, pursuant to which Catsimatidis acquired an interest in SemGroup's asphalt business and dropped his competing plan for the company's proposed reorganization.

Recovery

On December 1, 2009, SemGroup exited bankruptcy under a new corporate structure, eliminating its

master limited partnership In the United States, a master limited partnership (MLP) or publicly traded partnership (PTP) is a publicly traded entity taxed as a partnership. It combines the tax benefits of a partnership with the liquidity of publicly traded securities. To o ...

structure and becoming a publicly traded company focused on asphalt manufacture and marketing and on oil and natural gas storage and transport, with about 1,000 employees including 140 employees in Tulsa. SemGroup Energy Partners LP was renamed Blueknight Energy Partners LP. SemGroup Corporation's common stock was listed on the

New York Stock Exchange The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, nicknamed "The Big Board") is an American stock exchange in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is by far the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its listed c ...

on November 11, 2010. Two of its representatives rang the opening bell of the

on December 17, 2010. In November 2009,

Vitol Vitol is a Swiss-based multinational energy and commodity trading company that was founded in Rotterdam in 1966 by Henk Viëtor and Jacques Detiger. Though trading, logistics and distribution are at the core of its business, these are complemente ...

acquired the general partner of Blueknight. In October 2010, Vitol added Charlesbank Capital Partners as a second

general partner General partner is a person who joins with at least one other person to form a business. A general partner has responsibility for the actions of the business, can legally bind the business and is personally liable for all the partnership's debts an ...

; this led to public charges, by an investment fund associated with billionaire

Michael Dell Michael Saul Dell (born February 23, 1965) is an American billionaire businessman and philanthropist. He is the founder, chairman, and CEO of Dell Technologies, one of the world's largest technology infrastructure companies. He is ranked the 2 ...

, that the transaction was improper

self-dealing Self-dealing is the conduct of a trustee, attorney, corporate officer, or other fiduciary that consists of taking advantage of their position in a transaction and acting in their own interests rather than in the interests of the beneficiaries of ...

intended to take money from Blueknight's existing limited partners. Vitol denied these charges. In October 2011, the company fought a

hostile takeover In business, a takeover is the purchase of one company (the ''target'') by another (the ''acquirer'' or ''bidder''). In the UK, the term refers to the acquisition of a public company whose shares are listed on a stock exchange, in contrast to ...

offer from

Plains All American Pipeline Plains All American Pipeline, L.P. is a master limited partnership engaged in pipeline transport, marketing, and storage of liquefied petroleum gas and petroleum in the United States and Canada. It owns interests in of pipelines, storage capacity ...

. The offer was withdrawn in April 2012. In July 2017, the company acquired one of the largest oil terminals in the U.S. for over $2 billion. In March 2018 the company sold its Mexican asphalt business to

Ergon, Inc. Ergon, Inc. is a privately owned company based in Jackson, Mississippi. The company, founded by Leslie Lampton in 1954 with two employees, refines and distributes petroleum products and serves customers in over 90 countries. Companies and subs ...

for $72 million. In April 2018, it sold a petroleum products storage facility in the U.K. In December 2019, the company was acquired by

Leadership history

Thomas L. Kivisto co-founded SemGroup and served as its President and Chief Executive Officer. Another co-founder was Gregory C. Wallace, who served as

CFO The chief financial officer (CFO) is an officer of a company or organization that is assigned the primary responsibility for managing the company's finances, including financial planning, management of financial risks, record-keeping, and financ ...

. In 2008, Terry Ronan replaced Kivisto as President and CEO. In September 2009, SemGroup announced a new leadership team, to be led by a new president and CEO, Norm Szydlowski, an experienced oil industry executive who had previously served as president and CEO of

Colonial Pipeline The Colonial Pipeline is the largest pipeline system for refined oil products in the U.S.NRG Energy, Inc. and previously president/CEO of

GATX GATX Corporation is a railcar lessor that owns fleets in North America, Europe, and Asia. In addition, jointly with Rolls-Royce Limited, it owns one of the largest aircraft spare engine lease portfolios. It is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. ...

Terminals. President and CEO Carlin G. Conner was named to the company's top role effective April 1, 2014. Thomas R. McDaniel became chairman of the SemGroup board of directors on January 1, 2017. McDaniel served as a director of SemGroup since 2009.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Semgroup 2000 establishments in Oklahoma 2019 disestablishments in Oklahoma 2019 mergers and acquisitions Companies formerly listed on the New York Stock Exchange Companies established in 2000 Companies that filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2008 Energy companies established in 2000 Non-renewable resource companies established in 2000