CohnReznick Capital Markets Securities LLC announced an expansion of its investment banking services to the oil and gas sector, including the hiring of additional, key personnel. Given the consistent decline in national coal output, the recent proliferation of new drilling in North America and the steep decline in the price of oil and gas, demand for investment banking services in this sector has become even more critical.

“I cannot think of a more propitious time for us to align our capital markets services with the oil and gas industries,” said the firm’s president Rob Sternthal. “Both the increased demand for oil and gas produced in North America, along with the availability of global capital, have contributed to an environment where the strategic expansion of our services has become extremely timely and urgent to our clients.”

To underscore the firm’s decision to expand its services, two new executives, Sam Xu and Evan Turner, were recently hired to augment CohnReznick Cap Markets’ presence in the marketplace. Xu joins CohnReznick Cap Markets from the oil and gas investment banking firm KLR Group, and was involved in all aspects of a number of significant mergers, acquisitions, and other transactions in the E&P sector.

Turner previously worked at Canaccord Genuity, where he performed sell-side research and fundamental analysis of U.S. E&P companies, providing investment recommendations and analysis on M&A transactions, asset sales/purchases, and debt and equity offerings. He previously served as an analyst of upstream oil and gas research for GlobalData.