page_title: Aubrey McClendon
section_title: Chesapeake Energy Corporation
hierarchical_section_title: Aubrey McClendon / Business career / Chesapeake Energy Corporation
caption_attribution_description: English: Chesapeake Energy Building(formerly Pier One Imports Building) in Fort Worth, Texas
context_page_description: Aubrey Kerr McClendon was an American businessman and the founder and chief executive officer of American Energy Partners, LP. He also co-founded Chesapeake Energy, serving as its CEO and chairman. He was an outspoken advocate for natural gas as an alternative to oil and coal fuels, and a pioneer in employing fracking.
  McClendon was a part-owner of the National Basketball Association's Oklahoma City Thunder franchise, and was part of the ownership group that moved the Seattle SuperSonics to Oklahoma City in 2008.
  On March 1, 2016, McClendon was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of conspiring "to rig bids for the purchase of oil and natural gas leases in northwest Oklahoma". He died the following day, March 2, 2016, in a single-vehicle collision.
context_section_description: In 1983, McClendon and Tom L. Ward "threw in together" in their initial venture into oil and natural gas. Together, they co-founded Chesapeake Energy Corporation in 1989. McClendon and Ward were both 29 at the time. McClendon began as chairman and chief executive officer of Chesapeake, while Ward served as president and chief financial officer. The company began drilling its first two wells in Garvin County, Oklahoma, in May 1989.
  With Chesapeake, McClendon focused on drilling wells into unconventional reservoirs such as fractured carbonates and shales and was an early adopter of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing techniques, which helped accelerate the company's fast early growth. His focus on these new and unconventional techniques later led to him being called a "visionary leader" in the oil and natural gas industry.
  He took the firm public in 1993, and in the following three years its stock was the most successful in the country, rising 274% in value from 1994 to 1997, according to The Wall Street Journal.
  In 2005, Forbes Magazine named McClendon one of the country's top-performing executives for his role at Chesapeake. A few years later, he was the highest paid CEO of all the S&P 500 companies in 2008, receiving a compensation package totaling $112 million.
  In 2008, McClendon was notified that his shares were no longer valuable enough to back a margin loan with Goldman Sachs and other banks. In response, McClendon was forced to sell a majority of his 31.5 million shares, comprising 94% of his stake in Chesapeake and 6% of the company. The following year, Chesapeake offered McClendon a five-year retention contract, including a $75 million bonus.
  In 2011, Forbes called McClendon "America's most reckless billionaire" in a cover story on his career. The profile noted his high risk tolerance and cited the sale of his shares in 2008 as a reckless move. The same year, the magazine named McClendon to its 20-20 Club, comprising the eight CEOs of public companies who had delivered annualized returns of more than 20% over a 20-year period. McClendon dismissed those who described him as a risk-loving wildcatter. "If I wanted to always do the most popular thing, then I'd be a follower," he said in 2012. "The funny thing is that I don't consider myself a gambler at all. A gambler is somebody who just closes their eyes and rolls the dice. We don't do that".
  Chesapeake continued to grow its gas production under McClendon from 5 million to 2.5 billion cubic feet per day from 2009 to 2013. Chesapeake's discovery of large reserves of natural gas was reported to have helped reduce natural gas prices to consumers in the U.S.
  In a 2012 opinion piece discussing the development of the domestic oil and natural gas industry of the U.S. in the first decade of the 21st century, the former United States Secretary of Energy and Houston mayor Bill White described McClendon as "at the forefront of those heroes" of the American natural gas industry.
  According to allegations reported in Reuters in April 2012, McClendon took out more than $1 billion in personal loans, to finance drilling costs, from firms that were lenders to Chesapeake. This raised the potential for conflicts of interest and prompted questions on the corporate governance and business ethics of Chesapeake's senior management.
  On February 20, 2013, Dow Jones reported that a Chesapeake board review found no improper conduct, no improper benefit to McClendon and no increased cost to the company.
  On June 7, 2012, Reuters alleged that McClendon had used Chesapeake employees to perform $3 million of personal work, including engineering and accounting support and the repair of his house, in 2010. He had also used corporate planes for non-business-related travel for the McClendons' family and friends. According to Chesapeake's proxy statement filed with the SEC on May 11, 2012, McClendon reimbursed the company for all but $250,000 of the employee costs. His employment agreement authorized the personal use of company aircraft by McClendon, his immediate family members and guests, "f
caption: The Chesapeake Energy Building in Fort Worth, Texas, from 2008 to 2014, now the Pier 1 Imports Building.[12]
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