Haggling

After months of haggling, hedge fund TPG-Axon Capital, which owns 7.3% of outstanding SandRidge Energy Inc. shares, has gained at least a portion of the changes it had urged at the Oklahoma City-based company, and it stands poised to remove CEO Tom Ward or take control of the board of directors.

Ending weeks of haggling over critical energy legislation, the Republican-led Senate threw in the towel last Thursday night, substituting last year’s Democrat-crafted energy bill for this year’s legislation and passing it by a vote of 84-14. The first time around — in April 2002 — the same bill cleared the Senate by a bipartisan vote of 88-11 (see NGI, April 29). Last week’s vote, which sets the stage for Congress to vote out the first piece of major energy legislation in 11 years, came as Congress prepared to leave for its August recess.