Davis Ravnaas
Analyst · RBC. Please proceed with your question
Thanks Bob. Good morning everyone. Total fourth quarter 2018 revenues increased 64% from the prior quarter to $30.3 million and we're up $20.6 million from the fourth quarter last year. Fourth quarter 2018, net loss attributable to common units was $1.6 million or $0.10 per common unit, primarily due to a non-cash impairment of $12.6 million compared to a net loss attributable to common units of $3.7 million in the prior quarter and net income of approximately $1.1 million in the fourth quarter last year. General and administrative expenses were $5.2 million in Q4 2018 of which $4.2 million was cash G&A and included $0.9 million in costs associated with the transition services agreement, which relates to the integration of the Haymaker Acquisition. This agreement expired at year-end 2018 and no further costs will be incurred relating to this agreement in 2019. Consolidated adjusted EBITDA, a new record was $14.9 million versus $14 million in the prior quarter and $6.3 million a year ago. Please keep in mind that on December 20, 2018, we closed the Drop Down transaction for approximately $90 million. Even though the effective date of this transaction was October 1, 2018, and Kimbell was entitled to cash flows from these assets as of this date, under generally accepted accounting principles, GAAP, Kimbell only begins recording production, revenues, net income and other financial measures as of the closing date, which was December 20, 2018. Thus, the above average fourth quarter 2018 highlights only reflect 11 days operational activity from the Drop Down assets. I'd like to reiterate something that Bob mentioned because it's a critical point to understand about our business model. Our organic PDP reserve growth, excluding acquisitions was up 5% year-over-year at no cost to us. This is a differentiator compared to other company business models within the upstream sector that have high PDP decline rates year-over-year. Those companies have to grow production and reserves and they have to pay for that growth with CapEx at a much higher rate to offset the declines. I'd like to also point out that if we had owned the Haymaker and Drop Down assets for the entire year, organic production growth would have been 5% again at no cost to us. We have wind at our backs as we navigate the cyclical business of oil and gas production through solid and continued organic growth and production and reserves. Cash available for distribution attributable to the common units was $5.5 million. You'll find a reconciliation of both adjusted EBITDA and cash available for distribution at the end of our news release. As Bob mentioned, our fourth quarter cash distribution was $0.40 per common unit, up 11% compared with the fourth quarter last year. To be clear, we expect to add minimal corporate taxes due to our significant tax yields for the foreseeable future and our distributions are substantially nontaxable as they are considered a return of capital. These factors are something that we don't think the market appreciates. Average realized price per barrel for oil was $53.77, natural gas per 1,000 cubic feet was $3.21 and natural gas liquids per barrel was $22.39. As of 12/31/18, our hedges were approximately 24% of our average daily oil and natural gas production for the next two years. Now looking at the balance sheet. As of December 31, we had cash on hand of $15.8 million and about $87 million outstanding on our $200 million revolving credit facility. As we've indicated before, our plan is to use the revolver to provide short-term financing for acquisitions. Our debt-to-adjusted-EBITDA ratio was 1.2x, reflecting a full quarter of the Drop Down assets based on Q4 annualized consolidated adjusted EBITDA. Once the EnCap transaction closes, we plan to provide full year guidance for 2019. Lastly, I would like to make some important high-level observations about the current state of the company. From the time of our IPO, just 24 months ago, our production has more than tripled. Our balance sheet is rock solid and we are a pure mineral and royalty company with no working interests, unlike some of our peers and no operating costs or capital expenditure requirements. We have proven our ability to execute on our growth strategy through transformative accretive acquisitions and we’ve changed from an MLP to a C-corp tax structure to attract more investors. And this has resulted in an increase in trading volume by over 200%. Most importantly, we have grown our distribution by over 30% since our first full quarter as a public company. We do not believe the market fully appreciates our growth strategy and significant cash generation. And because of our high tax yields, we expect to have only modest corporate taxes for the foreseeable future and our distributions will substantially be a return of capital, which is nontaxable to unitholders. We continue to believe that we're significantly undervalued at an approximate 9% yield for 2018 with a near 100% tax yield. I cannot stress this enough. I want to be perfectly clear on this point. A 9% after-tax yield is equivalent to an approximate 14% pretax yield, assuming the top marginal tax rate of 37%. This is a critical point that needs to be made for people to understand how investing in our company compares on an apples-to-apples basis to investing in any other distribution paying or income-producing business. We will continue to beat the drum on this point and we are optimistic it will eventually resonate. Given our record-setting operational performance and the fact that we are a diversified royalty company with the best-in-class PDP decline rate, we believe that we are the least risky asset class in the upstream oil and gas universe. I will repeat what I've said in the past. Where else can you find an approximate 9% tax-free yield and a company with lower risk, stable assets and with the business model that has proven its ability to grow both organically and through acquisitions. As Bob mentioned, our team has done an outstanding job this year and we cannot be more pleased with the status of our company as we started 2019. I want to thank our friends and future partners at EnCap for the faith they have placed in our management team and business model by accepting 100% equity in this latest transaction. I also want to thank again our friends and partners at KKR and Kayne Anderson, who continue to be very supportive of our team and business model. We intend to be very busy in 2019. We plan to spend a significant amount of our time to educating the market about the Kimbell story, our differentiated and sustainable business model and the minerals and royalties space more broadly. We will be out telling our story to investors. So far this year, we have participated already in four investor conferences, and we've committed to participating in nine more conferences this year. We believe we are still and only the first chapter of the oil and gas royalty story. By our estimates, over $13 billion has been invested by private equity sponsors and institutional investors into the private mineral market over the last five years. We believe that only a small number of these private companies in our space will actually go public. So substantially all of the remaining capital, we believe will be looking at companies, such as ours and our peers for an exit. We have the unique opportunity to continue to lead the way, along with our peers and growing the public royalty sector. We believe that as our sector grows in size, it will inevitably attract more institutional capital and interest, which will lead to more liquidity, along with that will come increased analyst coverage and ultimately more attention from generalist investors. We believe that all of these factors will result in a greater appreciation for the excellent risk-adjusted return that ourselves and our public peers generate, and that this will eventually result in a re-rate for our entire public sector to a higher multiple, which will in turn, make it easier for ourselves and our peers to make accretive acquisitions from the private markets. To conclude, while the oil and gas royalty business has been around for a 100 years, it’s placed as an institutional asset class within the upstream sector is just getting started. I'll again remind everyone that the royalty space is at least $500 billion in size by our estimates and only approximately 2% of this market is captured by ourselves and our publicly traded peers. In just 24 months, we have built $1 billion business, pro forma for the recently announced EnCap acquisition through organic growth and accretive acquisitions. We believe we have earned the right to call ourselves the leader in the royalty sector and have proven our ability to close complicated and accretive transactions and to treat sellers fairly. We will continue to be a leader in this space and execute to enhance value for our unitholders. With that, operator, we are now ready for questions.