Pursuits
An Energy Firm's Collapse Casts Ominous Sign Over Mortgage Bonds
- Samson Resource's shrinking offices seen as harbinger
- Landlords to oil industry feel the pain of plunging crude
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A pair of office towers in Tulsa, Oklahoma, is giving commercial real estate investors more reason to worry that the collapse in oil prices is starting to infect their market.
The biggest tenant, oil and gas producer Samson Resources Corp., vacated one of the more than a dozen floors it occupied, according to a report from the firm that services a $45 million mortgage on the buildings known as the Williams Center Towers. Samson, which is cutting its workforce as it prepares to file for bankruptcy protection this month, has indicated it will abandon another floor next year, and its lease gives it the right to withdraw from more space after that, according to the report.