Par Petroleum has made some major changes in order to improve the company.
Effective Oct. 20, 2015, Par Petroleum Corp. will change its name to Par Pacific Holdings, Inc. The name change is meant to more accurately reflect Par’s growth strategy of building and acquiring businesses. The company’s ticker symbol, PARR, will remain the same. Along with the name change, the company has appointed William Pate, a current board member, as president and CEO.
Par’s current CEO, Joseph Israel, will remain on the Board of Directors of Par Pacific and will be named president and CEO of the refining, marketing and logistics business, which will be renamed Par Petroleum LLC.
“Bill is exceptionally capable with a proven record of building shareholder value. I have worked closely with him in successfully developing companies for over twenty years. He has been instrumental in establishing the successful entity that Par is today. His extensive experience in the energy space, combined with his expertise in identifying, funding and developing acquisitions, will help us accelerate our acquisition strategy to take advantage of the current commodity price environment,” said Melvyn Klein, chairman of the Board of Directors. “We are delighted Joseph is taking the lead as president of Par Petroleum to specifically focus on enhancing the refining, marketing and logistics piece of our business.”
“I look forward to working with Joseph and the rest of the Par Pacific management team, who have performed an outstanding job in building our refining, marketing and logistics operation in Hawaii. I am also delighted to be associated with our other holdings including the natural gas development efforts of Piceance Energy LLC, which continues to produce strong results despite the current commodities price environment,” Pate said, commenting on his appointment.
“It is an exciting time in the energy and infrastructure space, with ample opportunities for development and growth. Par’s past performance speaks for itself and I plan to expand our existing footprint by developing and acquiring market-leading energy and infrastructure businesses, leveraging our approximately $1.4 billion NOL tax asset and our talented management team and Board of Directors,” Pate added.
Prior to joining Par, Pate was the co-president of Equity Group Investments (“EGI”), the Chicago-based private investment firm founded and led by Sam Zell. Through an affiliate, EGI is the largest shareholder of Par. In his 21 years at EGI, Pate led a team that completed successful investments in many business sectors including energy, power, infrastructure, logistics, chemicals, financial services and health care. Many of these investments included holding companies that had tax attributes and multiple lines of business, similar to Par. Pate is the former chairman of the Board and a long-time director of Covanta Holding Corporation, an international owner/operator of energy-from-waste and power generation facilities.
