"It’s clearly a disappointing deal” for investors, says Jay Hatfield, portfolio manager of the InfraCap MLP exchange-traded fund, of Energy Transfer Equity's (ETE, ETP) takeover of Williams Cos. (WMB, WPZ), but bad timing and evidence of panic selling among MLPs exacerbated today's selloff.
But Hatfield is not against the deal or the MLP space, seeing eventual upside for ETE but perhaps not be until 2016, when deal closes and energy prices have stabilized; "It is a great idea for 2016, but there may be better opportunities before then," Hatfield says.