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 The firm's roots go back almost 20 years to its creation as the
energy arm of Louis Dreyfus [LOUDR.UL]. Since 2013, after being sold
to a private equity group that includes Paul Tudor Jones and Glenn
Dubin, it has doubled in size to over 650 staff and entered new
markets including iron ore and base metals.
Run by former Enron trader William C. Reed II, Castleton is best
known for its legacy strength in power, natural gas and liquid gas
market, but it has recently been expanding its footprint through a
series of smaller deals, buying coal blending terminals and
launching a metals desk.
Natural Gas Intelligence, an industry journal, ranked it as the
13th-largest natural gas trader in North America, handling 2.67 bcf
per day in the fourth quarter last year.
The Morgan Stanley deal will vault it into the big leagues for oil
trading, giving it, 45 oil storage leases for some 30 million
barrels, as many as 200 staff from the biggest physical oil desk on
Wall Street, and an unidentified number of oil supply and purchase
agreements, according to CCI.
Here is a timeline of select key events in its history:
1997
* Louis Dreyfus creates energy trading subsidiary
2002
* Begins leasing storage and transport business for refined
products, operating out of Houston, Montevideo Uruguay, Geneva
Switzerland and Singapore
2006
* Highbridge Capital Management, LLC makes a "significant minority
equity investment" in Louis Dreyfus's energy trading unit, creating
Louis Dreyfus Highbridge Energy (LDH)
2008
* Acquires the Cyrus River coal storage and blending terminal on the
Big Sandy River in Kenova, West Virginia, with 5 million tons per
year of storage and blending capacity
2011
* Sells all its midstream assets to Energy Transfer Partners LP and
Regency Energy Partners LP for $2 billion
* Begins freight trading and vessel operating business run out of
Stamford, Geneva and Singapore
* Acquires the Slones branch coal terminal in Pike County, Kentucky
where up to 3 million tons per year capacity
2012
* Seals first power generation investments: Wichita Falls, Texas,
cogeneration plant and Rensselaer cogeneration plant near Albany,
New York
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Since then, it has grown the portfolio and owns and operates of over
1,400 MWs of generation capacity located in Texas and New York
*On Dec. 31, management and a group of private investors including
hedge fund heavyweights Paul Tudor Jones, Timothy Barakett and Glenn
Dubin buy LDHE from Louis Dreyfus Group and a hedge fund owned by
JPMorgan Chase & Co
Firm renamed Castleton Commodities International LLC
2013
*Begins trading and marketing physical and financial iron ore in the
United States, Asia and Latin America
*Buys the Paradox natural gas assets from Patara Oil & Gas LLC and
sets up Denver office to oversee activities in Rocky Mountain region
*Buys Robinson's Bend Field nat gas field in the Black Warrior Basin
in Tuscaloosa County, Alabama, from Constellation Energy Partners
LLC
*Buys Roseton power generating station north of New York City
2014
*Buys Gulf Coast portfolio through multiple transactions, starting
with the acquisition of Patara Oil & Gas LLC's East Texas nat gas
assets
*Acquires the San Juan gas processing plant Farmington, New Mexico
and pipelines traversing Utah and New Mexico from Anadarko Petroleum
Corp
2015
*Launches global physical base metals trading business
(Reporting by Josephine Mason; editing by Diane Craft)
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