Operator
Operator
Good day and welcome to the ONEOK and ONEOK Partners’ 2012 Fourth Quarter Earnings Call. Today’s conference is being recorded. At this time, I’d turn the conference call over to your host, Mr. Andrew Ziola. Please go ahead sir.
ONEOK, Inc. (OKE)
Q4 2012 Earnings Call· Tue, Feb 26, 2013
$90.84
+1.39%
Same-Day
+1.80%
1 Week
+2.24%
1 Month
+7.52%
vs S&P
+3.09%
Operator
Operator
Good day and welcome to the ONEOK and ONEOK Partners’ 2012 Fourth Quarter Earnings Call. Today’s conference is being recorded. At this time, I’d turn the conference call over to your host, Mr. Andrew Ziola. Please go ahead sir.
Andrew Ziola
Management
Thank you, Karen, and welcome to ONEOK and ONEOK Partners’ fourth quarter and year-end 2012 earnings conference call. I’d remind you that statements made during this call that might include ONEOK or ONEOK Partners’ expectations or predictions should be considered forward-looking statements and are covered by the Safe Harbor provision of the Securities Acts of 1933 and 1934. Actual results could differ materially from those projected in any forward-looking statements. For a discussion of factors that could cause actual results to differ, please refer to our SEC filings. Our first speaker will be John Gibson, Chairman and CEO of ONEOK and ONEOK Partners. Mr. John?
John W. Gibson
Management
Thanks, Andrew. Good morning and many thanks for joining us today. As always, we appreciate your continued interest in investment in ONEOK and ONEOK Partners. Joining me today are Derek Reiners, our newly named Chief Financial Officer who will review our quarterly results and revised 2013 and three-year earnings guidance; Terry Spencer, our President who will review our operating performance, update you on the partnership’s growth projects, which are on time and on budget, and also discuss current market conditions including NGL supply and demand and the implications of lower NGL prices; also on the call and available to answer questions are Pierce Norton, Executive Vice President of Commercial and Rob Martinovich, Executive Vice President of Operations. I’d like at this time to thank Rob and Pierce for their contributions in their previous roles, and congratulate them and others on their new assignments that we announced in December. On this mornings call we will review our fourth quarter and 2012 financial results discussed our revised 2013 earnings guidance and our revised three year financial forecast that have been updated to reflect lower expected results in the partnership primarily in our NGL segment due to the impact of anticipated prolonged ethane rejection. We will review our progress on our growth projects including our projects we are about to complete, and close with some comments about our future growth prospects. Let start with our fourth quarter and year-end performance, ONEOK Partners turned in a solid performance for the year reflecting continued volume growth in both the Natural Gas Liquids and Natural Gas Gathering and Processing businesses primarily as a result of our past capital investments. However our 2012 fourth quarter results were lower compared with the same period in 2011, when we experienced historically wide NGL location price differentials. Our natural gas…
Derek S. Reiners
Management
Thanks, John, and good morning. ONEOK’s fourth quarter net income was $112 million or $0.53 per diluted share, compared with $115 million or $0.55 per diluted share for the same period last year. Results in the partnership were lower in the fourth quarter compared with the same period in 2011 due to narrower NGL price differentials compared with historically wide differentials in 2011. Natural gas and NGL volume growth at the partnership was solid, as a result of several growth projects completed in 2012. Results from the natural gas distribution segment were higher due to increased rates in all three states and lower operating expenses. Challenges in the Energy Services segment continue with lower storage and marketing margins, and lower premium services margins. ONEOK’s full year net income was approximately $361 million unchanged from 2011 and it’s 2012 standalone cash flow before changes in working capital of $709 million exceeded capital expenditures and dividend payments by $141 million. In 2012, ONEOK received $437 million in distributions from ONEOK Partners, a 31% increase over 2011. As John mentioned, our 2013 net income guidance is now expected to be in the range of $350 million to $400 million due to lower anticipated earnings in the ONEOK Partners segment. Terry will discuss the specific segment guidance revisions in a moment. As stated in our news release, ONEOK now expects its net income to increase by an average of 15% to 20% annually over the three-year period ending in 2015. In January, we increased our dividend $0.03 to $0.36 per share, an 18% increase since January 2012, the expected dividend increase in July 2013 has been revised to $0.02 per share subject to Board approval. This increase will result in a total dividend increase of 17% for 2013 compared with 2012, and as John…
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Thanks Derek and good morning. Let me begin my comments with our natural gas distribution segment. Fourth quarter and full-year 2012 earnings were higher compared with the same period last year. Reflecting higher rates in Oklahoma, Kansas, and Texas, and lower share based compensation cost as result of fewer shares of the Company’s common stock being awarded to employees in 2012 as part of our stock award program. The natural gas distribution segments operating income guidance for 2013 remains at $227 million. On the regulatory front, the Kansas Corporation Commission in December 2012 approved an increase in Kansas Gas Service’s annual rates by a net amount of $10 million, which became effective in January. Energy Services continues to experience a very challenging market, and for 2012 the segment realized an operating loss of $78 million due to low natural gas prices, and low natural gas price volatility, and narrower location and seasonal natural gas price differentials. Energy Services segment 2013 guidance remains at an operating loss of $20 million as it continues to face tough market conditions, but we are making progress and our efforts to realign our leased storage and our transport capacity with the needs of our premium service with customers. John that concludes my remarks to ONEOK.
John W. Gibson
Management
Thank you, Terry. Now Derek will review ONEOK Partners’ financial performance, and then Terry will come back and review the Partnership’s operating performance, its growth projects, and give you an update on our view of the current long-term NGL market dynamics.
Derek S. Reiners
Management
Thanks, John. ONEOK Partners’ full year 2012 net income was $888 million, a 7% increase compared with 2011’s record performance. ONEOK Partners’ fourth quarter net income was $210 million, compared with $299 million for the same period last year. The fourth quarter results reflect natural gas and NGL volume growth as a result of several growth projects completed in 2012, but results were offset by narrower NGL location price differentials. For 2012, distributable cash flow increased 7% compared with 2011 resulting in an annual coverage ratio of 1.34 times. Quarterly distributable cash flow decreased compared with the fourth quarter of 2011, resulting in a coverage ratio of 1.04 times. Our long-term annual coverage ratio target remains at 1.05 to 1.15 times, however in 2013 given ethane rejection and projected low commodity prices, our coverage ratio could be slightly below that, but we still expect to maintain a greater than 1.0 times coverage for 2013. Again, we will not sacrifice our credit metrics on investment grade credit ratings for the sake of holding to specific distribution growth rates. We’ve reduced the partnership’s 2013 net income guidance range to $790 million to $870 million and distributable cash flow is now expected to be in the range of $910 million to $1.0 billion, both are slightly lower than 2012 actual results. As mentioned in the news release, ONEOK Partners now expects EBITDA to increase by an average of 15% to 20% annually over a three-year period. We increase the distribution $0.025 per unit in the fourth quarter of 2012, an increase of 16% over the fourth quarter of 2011 distribution. Our 2013 revised guidance now includes a projected $0.05 per unit per quarter increase in unitholder distribution subject to Board approval, which would result in a total distribution increase of 7% for 2013…
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Thank you, Derek. As John said, the partnership performed well in 2012. the Natural Gas Gathering and Processing segment’s fourth quarter financial results were higher due primarily to volume growth, driven by increased well connections within our Williston Basin footprint. This volume growth was offset partially by higher compression costs and lower margins realized from new contracts as we compete for new and existing volumes in the Williston and lower realized natural gas and natural gas liquids prices. For 2012, natural gas volumes gathered increased to more than 8% and natural gas volumes processed increased more than 20%, driven by the new processing plants and related infrastructure projects completed last year. The Garden Creek natural gas processing plant continues to operate nearer to 100 million cubic feet per day capacity. Our Stateline I plant in the Williston Basin went into service in September 2012 and is also operating near capacity. Our Stateline II plant is expected to be in service this quarter with volumes steadily ramping up over the next several months, particularly after the completion of the Divide County natural gas gathering systems in the third quarter of this year. In 2013, we expect our processed volumes to be up 30% and gathered volumes to be up 22%. We also had a record year for new well connections, 940 wells in 2012 compared with 600 wells in 2011. This year, we expect to connect over 1000 wells. Crude oil production in the Williston Basin continues to grow along with the associated NGL rich natural gas, and we are working hard to quickly connect new wells and build the infrastructure required to reduce the continued flaring of natural gas. We’ve reduced the segment’s 2013 operating income guidance to $238 million, compared with $253 million reflecting our expectations of lower commodity…
John W. Gibson
Management
Thank you, Terry. Before we take your questions, I’d like to provide at this time, some additional comments regarding our future growth. The assets that we build and are building increased our ability to add volumes to our system. And it’s our volumes, our natural gas and natural gas liquids that enable us to collect a fee when we gather, process, fractionate, store and transport these volumes for our producers, our processors and our customers. While there has been a lot of attention on the contraction of NGL differentials between the Mid-Continent and the Gulf Coast market centers. , : A significant portion of the volumes we are adding to our systems deliver fee-based earnings and even in an environment of lower commodity price and narrow NGL differentials, we can continue to generate stable and sustainable earnings by providing non-discretionary services to our customers. These services will provide us and our customers, producers and investors with sustainable earnings over the long-term, regardless of short-term moves and differentials and prices. The incremental earnings from our projects both past and present will continue to give us the opportunity to grow our earnings at ONEOK and ONEOK Partners over the next three years, increased distributions to ONEOK Partner unitholders this year and beyond and increase the ONEOK dividend by 55% to 65% between now and 2015. While internal growth may not be as exciting or is headline grabbing, as an acquisition, our internal growth opportunity to provide investors with far better returns today than if we were to buy earnings at today’s prices. And we’re not done, as you’ve heard our internal growth, backlog is in excess of $2 billion, providing us with more earnings growth potential in the future. Of course, before we take our questions, most importantly I would like to express my thanks to more than 4,800 employees whose dedication and commitment allow us to operate our assets safely, reliably, and environmentally responsibly everyday and create exceptional value for our investors and our customers. Our entire management team appreciates their efforts to make our company successful. At this time, we are now ready to take your questions.
Operator
Operator
Thank you, sir. (Operator Instructions) We will take our first question from Chris Sighinolfi with UBS. Christopher P. Sighinolfi – UBS Securities LLC: Hey guys, good morning.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Good morning.
John W. Gibson
Management
Good morning. Christopher P. Sighinolfi – UBS Securities LLC: John, just curious, following on your last comments around moving towards fee for service business, it was stated in last night’s release that you are experiencing less favorable contract terms associated with the Williston Basin volume growth, just wondering what you meant by that, is it worse than what you are expecting or as it sort of interfaces with the rest of your businesses, is it just lower than what was there to begin with. Can you just give more color on that?
John W. Gibson
Management
It’s a term that we have used consistently in our Qs, our Ks and previous press releases. It drew a bit more attention than it probably deserves in this point in time because we are reducing 2013 and everyone is trying to understand why, but the basic is as we renegotiate expiring contract, expect for new, we are having to revise those terms to meet current market conditions and those are less favorable than perhaps either we thought they would be or they have been in the past. Christopher P. Sighinolfi – UBS Securities LLC: Okay. And so tied to the incremental growth that you have planned in that basin, it doesn’t change you forecast or what you’re going to spend versus what the returns on those projects are?
John W. Gibson
Management
That is correct. Christopher P. Sighinolfi – UBS Securities LLC: Okay. Thanks for that. Switching quickly, I was just curious from Terry with a $0.19 spread. I think the optimization was estimative comprised about 15% of their margin for the NGL segment in 2013. I’m just curious at $0.05 what the rough figure if you have one is on your expectation?
John W. Gibson
Management
That’s going to be much less than 10%. Christopher P. Sighinolfi – UBS Securities LLC: Okay, all right. And I guess finally John as you’ve been able to grow the dividend very strongly within the framework of a targeted pay out ratio of 60% to 70%, but a lot of peers are sort of increasingly looking towards cash flow coverage as sort of a guiding post for dividend policy, and I’m curious given that if there been a internal discussion with you and the Board as to maybe longer-term, how to approach dividend growth?
John W. Gibson
Management
There has been discussion at the Board about that. We will continue as we’ve indicated here along our current practice, I guess there has been discussions. Christopher P. Sighinolfi – UBS Securities LLC: Okay, I’ll hop back into the queue. Thanks guys.
John W. Gibson
Management
Yes, thank you.
Operator
Operator
We’ll move over to our next question from Steve Maresca with Morgan Stanley. Stephen J. Maresca – Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: Hey, good morning everybody.
John W. Gibson
Management
Hi, Steve. Stephen J. Maresca – Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: And thanks for taking my question. First what if you could talk John on others, on your latest thoughts on oil project opportunities, how aggressive do you plan on being in that area in light of the Bakken cancellation? Can you go back to the drawing board with a different project in that region?
Terry Spencer
Analyst
All right. Hello, I’ll take that one and of course, we were disappointed to postponed, but we all know the reasons why since that time if you look in particular, you have written a lot about the fact that producers are putting more and more of their crude on rail as opposed to long haul pipelines. There also has been a recent announcement utilizing existing pipelines to move crude from the producing region to the consuming region and that always is a smart use of capital dollars. So when you look at those, it doesn’t appear that the market is screaming quite as loudly for the Bakken/NGL pipeline as it once was. But your other point or question, we are able to quickly knock off the dust, so to speaking get engaged if the market needs that pipeline or one similar to it. Stephen J. Maresca – Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: If you were to focus on oil, would it be in that region or there are other areas that you would look at oil opportunities.
John W. Gibson
Management
We’d look at other areas but obviously where we have fuel we have a competitive advantage and it’s clear that we have a competitive advantage in the Bakken, in Williston in that area as opposed to say in the Eagle Ford but we have a effort within our organization focused on looking for crude oil opportunities. Stephen J. Maresca – Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: Okay, and my one follow up on a different topic. I don’t want to beat this because you have a lot of projected dividend growth, but you have a lot of extra cash flow per shares at OKE and you actually raised the cash flow guidance in 2013 a little bit, I know due to bonus depreciation but is there any particular reason that you don’t feel comfortable keeping that okay e-dividend growth given that what I think is a substantial cushion you have there to support it and are you worried at all about that being a drag on share price meaning lowering that dividend growth to share holders?
John W. Gibson
Management
Well, I am concerned. I think there are other things that we in the past have chosen to do with our cash. For example, we have used our cash at ONEOK to buy more equity in ONEOK Partners. That’s been an awfully good investment for us. We’ve purchased shares. We will continue. We want the flexibility to continue to do as we have in the past. I think as we look and Derek made a mention of this forward. We do loose some benefit associated with bonus depreciation. And as I read, we are prescribed to be or thought to be very conservative. I look it as much more long-term focus and want to do momentarily conservative, but we just want to make sure, we have the flexibility to do the things that we see opportunities to execute.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Okay. I am more than happy to keep you on if I have an answer to your question. Stephen J. Maresca – Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC: No, I think you have. We can touch basically offline. Thanks a lot. I will get back in the queue.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
There’s probably many others that have the same question.
Operator
Operator
And we will move on to Carl Kirst with BMO Capital Markets. Carl L. Kirst – BMO Capital Markets: Sorry John, I am laughing because I have the same question. And maybe just to paraphrase or perhaps just to make clear, we may say conservative, you say, long-term focused, but it’s not a, it’s on a prudency standpoint, it’s not from a perhaps skewing of the buyers down to fundamentals perhaps deteriorating from here rather than improving. We don’t want to misread this into essentially thinking that maybe you guys have a more negative outlook on the industry than we otherwise should?
John W. Gibson
Management
Yeah that is, no, let me start I said yes and no. Let me be clear, we do not have that view. We’re very optimistic. We look at to be continuing at the present level going forward. We made a judgment up there relative to what we see in 2013 to 2015 and felt like it was prudent for us to come back through 2012 particularly given the fact that we’ve reduced our distribution in ONEOK Partners, so we’ll have little bit less cash coming over from ONEOK Partners to ONEOK so all those things although pay maybe perhaps not every agrees with them. They due tie together and I think make good economic sense. Carl L. Kirst – BMO Capital Markets: Fair enough and then if I could just ask a clarification on Terry you made a mention of appreciative better framework for the $0.66 NGL assumption for 2013 about ethane prices being in the low 20s and I’m starting to say propane at convey at $0.90
John W. Gibson
Management
That’s correct. Carl L. Kirst – BMO Capital Markets: Okay. so essentially not too far away from what we’ve seen sort of year-to-date.
John W. Gibson
Management
That’s correct, you’re in the range. Carl L. Kirst – BMO Capital Markets: Okay, fair enough. And then lastly, if I could just on ONEOK Partners gathering and processing, just nodding that the gathering volume to the fee base gathering volumes were a little bit lighter in the fourth quarter than we were expecting by the same token it looks that like you bumped up the growth rate in 2013 to kind of account for a little bit later. And I didn’t know was there something that happened in November and December that cost of growth rate not to be quite as robust or they just kind of a generic activity of well hookups and is it possible to actually give us what the current run rate is?
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Well, as far as the volumes go, we’re in the midst of a pretty significant weather trend that’s started in about November and December of last year. So we were impacted pretty significantly by that. So what you’re seeing there is in the fourth quarter, certainly is an impact from that. And your last question was about… Carl L. Kirst – BMO Capital Markets: I don’t know, if you could give us the run rate for where those gathering and processing volumes stood today if possible?
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Well, we’re running about – in the range of about $250 million a day in the three processing plants that are currently operating there. So, but certainly as we bring on a new plant, the Stateline II plant, we’ll start, we’ll be ramping up those volumes as I mentioned in my comments. Carl L. Kirst – BMO Capital Markets: Okay, thank you.
John W. Gibson
Management
One of the things we have to remember is those assets are at north like we run an operation in Canada and of course, for those of you that they are watching the weather channel, we are experiencing some severe and heavy snow in Western Oklahoma, which undoubtedly will impact our processing plants and pipelines, but we’ll report on that when we talk to you about first quarter. Carl L. Kirst – BMO Capital Markets: Okay, great. Thank you.
Operator
Operator
(Operator Instructions) We’ll move on to our next question to Ted Durbin with Goldman Sachs. Ted J. Durbin – Goldman Sachs & Co.: Thanks. I wanted to just ask about your commodity mix, I think you have previously said your margin composition at OKS could be about 65% in fee-based with the new guidance here with sort of what component of your margin do you see are fee-based now?
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Ted, you’re going to be at about the 80% range.
John W. Gibson
Management
Roughly. Ted J. Durbin – Goldman Sachs & Co.: Okay. And then as you think… Yes sir.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Ted, about 70% where you’re going to be. Ted J. Durbin – Goldman Sachs & Co.: 70%, got it, it’s okay. And then as we think about sort of on a three year forward basis, you’ve taken the Bakken pipeline, the oil pipeline out, you’ve added some gathering and processing, do you see that mix staying in that 70% range or maybe it gets a little bit more commodity heavy as we have this growth in NGL prices, kind of how you’re seeing that over the three-year deal?
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Yeah. As we bring on the NGL projects, I mean those are all fee-based projects. Ted J. Durbin – Goldman Sachs & Co.: Right.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
So they’ll be pushing up – it will be pushing up our percentage of fee-based margins as we go forward. Ted J. Durbin – Goldman Sachs & Co.: Okay. Thanks, Terry. Just on the macro, you’ve talked about how much ethane rejection, you think it might be more than 175,000 a day, I guess I’m just curious if there’s that much of ethane that’s still waiting to come in, what gives you confidence that will turn around in 2014, and not still be in sort of ethane rejection at least still have pressure on prices?
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Well, Ted, I mean I think the key driver and all this is strong ethane demand, I mean the petrochemicals, I mean their consumption is pushing million barrels a day and we’re expecting to go even higher. Once we get this ethane inventory overhang worked off, which we expect to happen in 2013, then we should be in the clear as we move into 2014 and 2015 and of course, we’ll have some periods of ethane rejection, but we’re really confident just from what we’re seeing, I mean as I indicated in my comments, we think the ethane rejection is happening at a significantly greater level, just as evidenced by the ethane rejection we’re experiencing on our own systems. So but we really think this thing will get worked off this year, many of the experts and those in the industry believe the same thing. And by 2014, we should be in pretty good shape as well as, as we move into 2015 and hopefully, we’ll get to 2016 and 2017 be in really good shape. Ted J. Durbin – Goldman Sachs & Co.: Right, great. And then the last one from me is just, you’ve mentioned the credit metrics has been in sort of defending the investment grade, it’s been a reason for the lower dividends and distribution growth. I guess I’m wondering if you can quantify those metrics that you’re targeting whether it’s at OKS or OKE. How you think about that mix or maybe get a little more fee-based and the ability that they run a little bit more leverage?
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Well, we’re talking about both equities; both credit ratings and we stay in contact with the rating agencies. We listen to what they say and others to guide our decisions. I mean as you know, there is no specific formula for what we’re trying to accomplish other than maintaining that 50% level. Johan anything you’d like to add, John?
John W. Gibson
Management
One thing I would add to that is a debt-to-EBITDA ratio we’ve spent before keeping that around 4 times or less. Ted J. Durbin – Goldman Sachs & Co.: Okay, that’s great. That’s it.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Does that help? Ted J. Durbin – Goldman Sachs & Co.: Yeah, that’s very helpful. Thank you.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
All right.
Operator
Operator
Next question will come from Citigroup, from Timm Schneider. Timm Schneider – Citigroup Global Markets Inc.: Hey, guys, most of my questions have actually been answered. Just one quick one, what’s driving the lower CapEx number in the NGL segment, fairly with old guidance versus new?
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Yeah. The Bakken Crude pipeline was in those numbers and is now out. So that’s a bulk of it. Timm Schneider – Citigroup Global Markets Inc.: Okay, got it. And then if you can, where you guys assuming for a 70 heavier into the barrel, the butanes and nat gasolines in 2013?
Terry K. Spencer
Management
You’re going to be somewhere in that $1.40, $1.50 range. Timm Schneider – Citigroup Global Markets Inc.: Okay.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
On the (inaudible) you could be pushing $2. Timm Schneider – Citigroup Global Markets Inc.: Okay, got it. That’s it from me. Thank you.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Thank you, Timm.
Operator
Operator
Next question will come from Helen Ryoo with Barclays. Helen Jung Ryoo – Barclays Capital, Inc.: Thank you. Good morning.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Good morning, Helen. Helen Jung Ryoo – Barclays Capital, Inc.: Hi, I will just start with the clarification question on your NGL price assumption for this year. Did you say that that was before TNF, and that was mostly based on Conway exposure?
John W. Gibson
Management
That’s correct Helen. Helen Jung Ryoo – Barclays Capital, Inc.: Okay. And then what is your NGL equity barrel mix assuming full recovery of ethane, is ethane much higher than 50% level?
Terry K. Spencer
Management
No. You are going to be somewhere in the neighborhood of 45% to 50%. I mean it’s going to be pretty typical for the industry. Helen Jung Ryoo – Barclays Capital, Inc.: Okay.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
45% to 50% range is going to get you there. Propane, Helen you probably be in that 30%-35% range. Helen Jung Ryoo – Barclays Capital, Inc.: Okay. So the assumption of $0.66 before standup, are you assuming price to get lower from the current level? How should I compare that number to what the current Conway pricing?
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Yeah, we are actually on ethane. In our assumption, the ethane prices are probably a bit lower than what we are actually seeing today. Propane prices in our assumption are a bit higher, is slightly higher, I mean you are in the range. So I mean it make sense, if you compare to today’s spot hosting, and look at the forward curve, it makes sense. Helen Jung Ryoo – Barclays Capital, Inc.: Okay, got it. And then just one quick follow-up on different topic; your interest expense guidance, does that assume some of your high cost funds being hold or tendered this year?
John W. Gibson
Management
No, it does not. Helen Jung Ryoo – Barclays Capital, Inc.: Okay, great. Thank you very much.
John W. Gibson
Management
Thank you, Helen.
Operator
Operator
Next we will move on to John Edwards with Credit Suisse. John D. Edwards – Credit Suisse Securities LLC: Yes hi, thanks for all the helpful comments on the NGL market. I just had a follow-up to Ted’s question there, just looking out, I think you said about a 700,000 barrel a day increase in ethane, and I didn’t catch through what timeframe was that 2015-’16? I didn’t catch.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
2016 to 2017. John D. Edwards – Credit Suisse Securities LLC: Okay all right that’s helpful, and then I think you made a comment that you are expecting I guess things to swing into possibly short supply than what, I guess I’m having trouble figuring out is – if that‘s the case, how some of the petchems would invest in steam fractures if – without secure supplies, so I am trying to figure out, are you really think the market is relatively balanced or are you really thinking it will be short.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Well I think that’s a great question, I think that – petrochemical companies recognize that as we map this thing out, and look over this timeframe that we could very well be in short supply. I don’t think they truly believe that, they wouldn’t be making these investments as they have a lot of confidence in the development, and the mid-stream development that’s happening upstream to get a lot of confidence in the shale plays. They are actively engaged with the midstream companies talking about drilling, and the development that‘s going on, so I think they really do have a lot of confidence, but as you look at the curves today, we could very well be in short supply, but I don’t – strongly do not believe, that’s what they think. John D. Edwards – Credit Suisse Securities LLC: Okay. And then I guess last question on those lines is, what kind of increase, you are speaking about increase in consumption, I guess this year being up 15% to 20% in consumption? What are you thinking, I guess ‘14, ‘15, ‘16 timeframe?
John W. Gibson
Management
I guess you are talking about consumption…. John D. Edwards – Credit Suisse Securities LLC: Of ethane, consumption of ethane…
John W. Gibson
Management
Yeah. I mean when you look at the 2014 to 2015 timeframe, we’re going to be in about that 1.3 million to 1.4 million barrels per day range. There was actually a chart that we’ve produced that we’ll show that to you. So we’ll see it ramping up in the million barrels a day pretty quickly over the 2013 as we move into 2014, 2015, we’ll be in that, I could say, 1.3 million barrels a day range or so. John D. Edwards – Credit Suisse Securities LLC: Okay, great, that’s very helpful. Thank you very much.
John W. Gibson
Management
You bet.
Operator
Operator
Craig Shere with Tuohy Brothers has our next question. Please go ahead. Craig K. Shere – Tuohy Brothers Investment Research, Inc.: Hi guys, I want to come back to the distribution question, but I kind of think about it more longer term, if I’m looking at this correct, saving I think was something like 1.5 of the CAGR and EBITDA growth to 2015 results in a much lower, modest EBITDA reduction, maybe $60 million or so. but the distribution guidance seems much greater relative to the EBITDA adjustment, and it seems like that’s driving potentially extremely conservative distribution coverage ratio into 2014, 2015. Am I thinking about that wrong and as you have these fee-based projects coming online, is there any reason you’d want to be going above your targeted cap of 1.15 times coverage in and out of years.
John W. Gibson
Management
Currently, as we move on more heavily weighted towards these fee-based arrangements, we’ll be more comfortable, we move towards the 1.15, stay within that 1.05 to 1.15 that clearly we’ve been above that in past. I believe in the ‘14 and ‘15, we’re above that as well. So I guess you are thinking about it correctly. Craig K. Shere – Tuohy Brothers Investment Research, Inc.: Okay. so it sounds like without even any change in guidance if your comfort level is that your expectations will not be worse than what you’ve laid out just on current guidance, you could probably look at choosing the distribution growth rate as far as 2015?
John W. Gibson
Management
Well, I mean as we typically do, we’ll look at that the quarter before. but not now from 2015, I mean the message is clear that in particular, our exposure to NGL barrel, ethane rejection is taking volume off of our systems and that volume as I mentioned earlier has dollars associated with it. So we know we’re not going to have as many dollars as we thought we would in 2013, primarily because of this prolonged expected ethane rejection, which is far longer than any of us with industry experience would anticipate or did anticipate. Our view is that we’ve spent most of the year at this level. do we have perfect knowledge? Of course, not, and if those volumes come back on to our systems, ethane rejection in another words is not as long as we anticipate it than you may rest assured that we will look at our distribution at ONEOK Partners as well as our dividend at ONEOK, Inc. But we will also be looking at that while at the same time; we look at our credit rating and those other metrics that we discussed earlier. Craig K. Shere – Tuohy Brothers Investment Research, Inc.:
John W. Gibson
Management
Well, as I mentioned earlier about what we have done historically with our cash in the past, increasing the dividend it’s certainly one of the things we’ve done and we obviously are going to continue to do investment in ONEOK Partners. We bought back shares, we still have as you point out the ability to buy back more. So we have all of those available to us and as I indicated earlier, we want to retain the flexibility to do those things that we think are – make good economic sense for the company, the shareholders and the unitholders. Craig K. Shere – Tuohy Brothers Investment Research, Inc.: Fair enough and last question probably for Terry. The re-contracting that you are talking about, did that relate to the condensate keep-whole volumes being down so much from third quarter and year-over-year?
Terry K. Spencer
Management
No, it did not. Craig K. Shere – Tuohy Brothers Investment Research, Inc.: What was driving that if I could ask?
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Craig, it’s just a growth in the POP business, and we’re ended up with the keep-wholes around 3% down from like 6%. So it’s just growth in the other contracts, that’s what driving those numbers. Craig K. Shere – Tuohy Brothers Investment Research, Inc.: But the keep-whole volumes aren’t stable against to growing high, because that the total volumes were down.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Well, I think it’s just fair to say that keep-wholes, it’s not material. It’s probably the best way to look at it, right, for gathering and processing in our company less than 5%? So you may not want to spend a lot of time on that now. Craig K. Shere – Tuohy Brothers Investment Research, Inc.: Okay fair enough. thank you, gentlemen.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Sure.
Operator
Operator
And we do have time for one last question. that will come from Michael Blum with Wells Fargo. Michael J. Blum – Wells Fargo Securities LLC: Okay, thank you. first question just as you have all this new processing capacity coming online over the next couple of years, once that’s all built out, what does your contract mix look like? Does it change much in terms of POP versus keep-whole versus fee?
Terry K. Spencer
Management
It will actually increase, if you’re looking at just the G&P segment, as we bring all these new plants in the Bakken. I mean we will become more commodity price sensitive. and so I can’t remember what’s the percentage max is out at least in the 2015 timeframe, but it’s not a huge increase, but it will go slightly as you look at just the G&P segment, but you got to remember much of that, at the partnership level gets offset, because in our NGL segment, all of our growth projects are fee-based. Michael J. Blum – Wells Fargo Securities LLC: Got it, okay.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Got it? Michael J. Blum – Wells Fargo Securities LLC: Yes. And then in terms of your new forecast or assumptions for the Conway to Mont Belvieu spread. Have you changed your fundamental view of what that spread will look like, I think historically, your view was – and correct me if I'm wrong that it would move ultimately to effectively to transport costs, but it seems like you’re at least for 2013 expecting that to be even tighter than that, I’m just trying to reconcile those?
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Mike, you just got to understand there are more products than just ethane and we’re giving you this $0.05 to $0.06 ethane forward-view, but there are other products that will be optimized that could be above that. So when you look at the overall average barrel, which we don’t advertise that number for competitive reasons, you could be more in that cost-to-build range. So I mean our view really hasn’t changed, I mean we expect these spreads to come to narrow. we’ve got an unusual situation with very high ethane inventories, and the heavy rejection that’s happening has really brought these spreads in, but our long-term view as of the spreads would narrow, because of the capacity that others and ourselves are bringing online over the course of the next couple of years. Michael J. Blum – Wells Fargo Securities LLC: Okay.
Terry K. Spencer
Management
Does that help you? Michael J. Blum – Wells Fargo Securities LLC: Yeah. It does, it does. And then last quick question from me that in the release, you have a table that shows the percent of NGL you hedged for 2013 at 45%, I’m assuming based on the price that you show there that there is no ethane that’s hedged today in that, I was wondering if there is also any propane in that number that consist all have heavier in that.
John W. Gibson
Management
That’s correct there is little to no ethane in that number, and there is some propane, and then heavier. Michael J. Blum – Wells Fargo Securities LLC: Okay great. Thank you very much.
John W. Gibson
Management
You bet, thank you Michael.
Andrew Ziola
Management
All right. Well, thank you for joining us everybody for ONEOK Partners’ unitholders K-1’s are now available online, and will be mailed out by tomorrow Wednesday, February 27. Our quiet periods of the first quarter starts when we close our books in early April, and extends until earnings are released after the market closes on April 30 followed by our conference call at 11 a.m. Eastern, 10 a.m. Central on May 1. We will provide details on the conference call at a later date. T.D. Eureste and I will be available throughout the day to answer your follow-up questions. Thank you for joining us and have a good day.
Operator
Operator
And again ladies and gentlemen that does conclude today’s conference. We thank you for your participation. Have a great day.