Battalion Oil has appointed Kristen McWatters as its new CFO, effective January 26, 2023. She replaces Kevin Andrews, who has agreed to stay on until April 13 in an advisory role. Mr. Andrews had been the CFO since August 2020.
The company is based in NW Houston and has working interests in approximately 40,000 net acres in the Delaware Basin. Its market capitalization is currently $193 million.
The company was formerly known as Halcon Resources. It went into bankruptcy in August 2019. The company emerged in October 2019, having eliminated over $750 million of debt. In return, the debt holders got 91% of the newly reorganized equity. It changed its name to Battalion in January 2020.
Ms. McWatters was previously the CFO at Goodrich Petroleum, a similar E&P company to Battalion. Goodrich went into Chapter 11 in 2016, she joined as Assistant Controller in 2017. The company regained its listing in April 2017 and Ms. McWatters became CFO in December 2020. She left after Goodrich was taken private by Encap Investments in a $480 million deal.
For the past few months, Ms. McWatters has been interim Chief Accounting Officer at Perella Weinberg Partners, a publicly-traded investment bank. Perella, through its subsidiary, TPH, happened to advise Goodrich on its sale transaction.
Ms. McWatters will receive a base salary of $300,000. No severance arrangements were disclosed for Mr. Andrews in the filing announcing Ms. McWatters’ appointment. According to the last proxy, Mr. Andrews is entitled to a payment of $500,000 if his employment is terminated without cause.